Characterization. How often do we label someone based on a single, or at best a few, data points? We saw great push back and awareness around this a number of years ago when advocates implored us to look past disabilities to the person. That the person should always be first. So (and I’m going to use a rather odd example) instead of referring to someone as a pox-marked person, refer to them as a person who has pox marks or who has had smallpox.
While the distinction may seem academic and a bit contrived, I think it is also important. It also reminds us that it is almost impossible to extend grace to someone when we dismiss them based on characteristic(s). We have arrived at a label that implies we know more than we really do. While that label may be true in some cases, e.g., having marks left from contracting smallpox is certainly observable, it is at best, incomplete.
We have also become a society in which that type of characterization is used to quiet voices with which we disagree or to lump someone into a stereotype. “Sorting” has always served as a short-cut to knowledge.
And it is lazy. I don’t need to bother finding out about you or getting to know you. I can dismiss you out of hand, or pity you, or make an assumption about you.
Years ago Jim Croce wrote in his song One Less Set of Footsteps: “after all it’s what we’ve done, that makes us what we are”. What he missed is what we’ve done may make us what we are but does not mandate the future. It is not the complete story.
God extends grace to each of us while knowing us completely – including the visible and the invisible. We are always the Beloved of God. Some of us are the Beloved of God with a limp, or depression, or a felony record, or a new job, or (fill in the blank). When we limit our views and perspectives to what we can see about someone or what we hear about them, sometimes we miss an opportunity. And sometimes we don’t. But how will we know?
Just Sayin' 