When we live the empty words we speak.

     Have you ever encountered a person who walks a hundred miles an hour?  I have.  They seem to be living on way too much caffeine and energy drinks!  As you see them coming you lock eyes with them and within the span of 10 feet they say, "How are you?" and in a flash are gone.  Empty words spoken at the speed of life.  If you are going to ask a question, take the time to listen for an answer.  It doesn't mean that you have to solve everyone's problems.  It means that you listened and cared enough to engage that person.  You may have been the only one who engaged them in a time of their own personal crisis.  I was once asked that question and heard back at me: "Really?  You want to know?"  I would love to tell you that I stopped and engaged.  However, I did not.  A missed opportunity because I began something I wasn't willing to complete.
     We make people invisible.  For instance, we all have seen the homeless begging and seeking "anything" to make their lives easier.  All the time an empty beer can on the ground and a cigarette hanging out of their mouths.  Yep, we stereotype people.  So, we don't look at them.  We glance at them and their sign and hope and pray that they don't engage us!  When we do engage, what do we have to offer?  Perhaps that's where the empty words are spoken most.  It's easy to intentionally miss the invisible people around us.  It may even be someone from your own family, your husband or wife, or even one or all of your children.  Somehow they are the receivers of all the empty words we speak.  "Not now."  "I'm busy."  "We will see."  "What did you say?"  The list goes on and on but the truth remains the same.  We ignore people with the empty words that we speak.  Then we are mystified when our children, friends and family all turn out just like us.  We become invisible in our old age or even sooner.
     When we live the empty words we speak we cheapen the worth of someone.  God isn't like that.  But then God is love and that's just the way love is.  Is that the key?  Is our love of others really not love at all and we can justify making empty statements verbally and physically?  Has it come to the point in our lives where we love ourselves and don't really love anyone else?  When are we going to take the time to listen before we speak?  I've uttered many prayers where I didn't listen to God before, during or after the prayer.  The words I spoke to God were empty.  This is reflective of times in my life when God wasn't important enough for me to live seriously for Him.  How are you?  That's what God asks.  He REALLY wants to know (not that he doesn't know anyway) from you personally.  That person who is asked about how they are is not convinced that you really care enough to stop yourself and be Jesus to them.  The child who is told "Because I said so!" for the 20th time that day knows that you don't really want to engage them.  We don't take the time to speak with them because we are so busy speaking to them.
     When we are "surface" people we are not doing what we are designed and commissioned to do.  If we only engage when it's comfortable or safe we are not bringing Christ to those around us.  Bringing healing to a hurting world is one of the most important activities you can engage in.  Why?  Because that's what Jesus did for you and I.  He stopped, listened, heard, and spoke because he cared about you individually and collectively.  I would challenge you as well as I to do the same.  Don't try to do this with everyone.  Just the people God wants you to care about.