Feeling like a leftover
Left over too long
Pushed to the back of the fridge,
Not even on the top shelf.
I sit on the fringes of a group--
A small group,
A step group,
A counseling group
Any group--
And wonder what I’m doing here.
How am I supposed to make it in life,
If I don’t know the rules,
Or if I do and take them far more seriously
Than anyone else?
In the cacophony of voices,
My soft voice, hesitant, gets drowned out,
Best heard in quiet conversation.
Yet I am here
In the group,
Trying to participate,
Participating just by my very presence,
In what was supposed to be supportive--
Loving, joyful, peaceful, patient,
Kind, compassionate,
Good, faithful,
And full of self-control*--
But what often becomes a pharisaical group
Being a sounding board
For the judgments we lay upon each other.
Why is it,
When we humans get together here on earth,
We almost always find it necessary
To judge others,
At the very least by their absence,
If nothing else serves immediately as a reason?
Why must we feel “better than”?
Maybe because otherwise we feel “less than”.
Can’t be negative in this world.
Feeling negative about ourselves,
We immediately pick on others--
And always in an area where we ourselves feel weakest.
We forget:
God is the Judge.
He loves us,
Just as we are.
He has plans for us,
Plans to heal and not to harm us.**
In God’s eyes,
We are far from leftovers--
We are, instead,
The ingredients for His finest works.
---
* Galatians 5:22-23 [NIV] But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
**Jeremiah 29:11 [ESV] For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.