"You be Jesus!"

I read a joke a few weeks ago, about two little brothers.  The mom is cutting cake for them, and one piece is bigger than the other, so they begin to argue about who will get it.  The mom explains to them that Jesus would look at the two pieces, and then say, "Let my brother have the bigger piece."  Immediately, one brother declares to his sibling, "Okay--YOU be Jesus!".

At the time, I cracked up at this!  But the other night, as I was driving home from work, it hit me that so often, we do this as adults.  If someone is rude to us, we want THEM to be Christ-like, to come to us and humbly apologize.  If someone offends us, we want THEM to recognize their sin and confess.  And if WE are the offender, we want the OTHER PERSON to be gracious and forgiving.  While we hold on to our hurt, our righteous indignation, our justified anger.

It's as if we're saying to the other person, in whatever situation, "YOU be Jesus!  I'm going to be here indulging my hurt, anger, selfishness (fill in the blank)."

What an amazing opportunity we have every day, in every situation, to say, "Let me be Jesus!  Let me allow His grace, love, mercy, kindness and forgiveness flow through me!  Let me be a light for Him!"  We have a choice, no matter what we're going through, no matter what life is throwing at us, to ACT and not REACT.  To make a conscious decision to live as Christ did.  To treat others as Christ would.  And to put aside our hurts and offenses and thoughts of self and say, "I'll be Jesus."  Praise God that He has given us His Holy Spirit to guide and aid us in even our smallest attempts to represent our Saviour to this hurting world.