From husband's blog

Intolerance revisited ...
Today was our annual Easter at the Ballpark outing. We have church service at the local Double A minor league baseball team's ballpark on Easter Sunday. We also supply a free lunch, easter egg hunt and free admission to the day's ballgame that evening. It's a nice idea. It was our first experience with this event and the concept is a good one. It is, no doubt, to reach out for all those that wouldn't darken the door of a church if their life depended on it. That isn't the only reason, obviously, but it will suffice for this piece.

My wife can't handle being in the sun for long at all. She blisters rather easily, so we sat by a folding table in folding chairs on the concourse, in the shade. My wife insists that I am ADD or ADHD or something like that. At times I do have trouble focusing, but who wouldn't at a ballpark, when you can't understand what is being said over the loud speaker and there are scads of people of all ages, shapes and sizes milling about. It is very easy to become distracted.

It was then that I remembered that whether we like our church or not, we have served God long enough to know that it is not all about us. My wife and I decided a week or so ago that we would go to church to be a blessing and not necessarily to be blessed.

I need to be Christ to people. That is a tall order, but we are not being asked to do the impossible. God enables those who have the "want to". I have to work on my "want to". I become too comfortable in my personal comfort zone. No one can hurt me there. No one can do anything to me there. But am I not like so many who look but do not see? I should never criticize another person's actions or inaction ever again. I shouldn't do that no matter WHAT I choose to do, but especially when I am mired in my quicksand-like comfort zone. I look passersby over and size them up. I decide, without ever having spoken to them, which ones are snobs, whores, rednecks, attention seekers ... you get the picture. I am guessing that more of us are like that then we would like to admit. It isn't pretty and I am not proud of the fact that I am like that. I struggle with doing it. It is not my place to do it. It is not my job to separate the wheat from the chaff. I will admit that I believe that God wants us to be fruit inspectors, but this is far different from what I am doing. I need to be Jesus to this folks. I have the heart's desire to do that, but I can't seem to put feet to that desire. It touches on the topic of intolerance once again. Simply by looking at someone, I have deemed them unworthy of an association with me. How can I do this? I don't really want to. In my heart of hearts I desire to be all things to all people. To reach out anonymously and quietly minister to the masses one by one. Once again I have romanticised a walk with Christ and touching others lives. I tend to romanticise a lot of events in my life. Making them seem bigger and more wonderful than they turn out to be and I end up disappointed. The bottom line is this: get out of myself, live for Christ and quit judging on appearances. Everybody aches and everybody needs Jesus. Someday I hope to step out of my selfish cocoon and actually DO what I claim to want to do. That's it ... I will stop flogging myself for now. Happy Resurrection Day!