Who is my neighbor

Who is my neighbor, I ask myself as I looked through my rolled-up window at the emaciated African-American woman standing at the traffic light. Her arms and legs were covered with marks, which I assume were the result of needles, and I was glad to be passing through this rough part of town. 

The next day, however, I sat in Sunday School looking at a painting of Jesus standing before the crowd after he was tortured and could only think about the woman on the street. Like her, Jesus’ arms and legs were covered with wounds. “Behold the man,” Pilate said, and I was filled with a profound sense of the world’s darkness and God’s grace colliding. Way back when and right this minute became entangled, and somehow I was being asked to make sense of it all.

I returned to my job on Monday morning where my class completed its poetry unit. I had my students read a wide range of poetry, from Mary Oliver to John Donne, and something told me, as if for the first time, that the key to my “one wild and precious life” was remembering that “no man (or woman) is an island.”

Life as it was intended to be, the kingdom of God as many call it, rests in our ability to see everyone, I mean everyone, as our neighbor.

The woman on the street and child in the seat beside me.

The people in Ukraine and the Russian solders being ordered to advance.

The people with bomb-ravaged homes and those whose homes have been ravaged by domestic abuse, addiction, and divorce.

The people out of work and those basking in significant success.

The man running through the neighborhood and the woman confined to a wheelchair.

The student with perfect SAT scores and the man who hasn’t recognized his wife in three years.

The crowd at the Greenpeace rally and those who stormed the capital.

No matter how hard we try to ignore it, no matter how quickly we roll up our windows, our neighbors are right in front of us. They may not look like us, behave like us, think, believe, or vote like us, but each is a beloved child of God. We may politely nod in the direction of such a truth on Sunday, maybe even give voice to it in prayer, but it’s back to business-as-usual on Monday. 

If God came and redeemed us, he came and redeem us all. I guess that’s why Christ looked so much like the woman on the street. In her scars, I need to see his scars. In her poverty, I need to see my abundance . . . and roll down the window.  Then, and only then, will the kingdom of God be at hand.