A Room Full Of Hearts

I see the chalk pavement picture as I am on my walk.
Since there has been no rain, the picture has been there for quite a while.
It is a child’s drawing of a rainbow.
Rather than red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, this rainbow is all blue.

I smile whenever I pass the chalk pavement picture.
Even though it is only one color, the shape of the drawing tells me it is a rainbow.
Some may try to guess why the little artist drew the rainbow completely in blue.
I prefer to think that blue was perhaps her favorite color.

People tend to make a big deal about color.
Joe Raposo, of Sesame Street fame, wrote a song about color.
His song was about one color in particular.
The song, (It’s Not Easy) Bein’ Green, was sung by Kermit the Frog.

It’s not easy bein’ green
Having to spend each day
The color of the leaves
When I think it could be nicer
Bein’ red or yellow or gold
Or something much more colorful like that
It’s not easy bein’ green
It seems you blend in
With so many other ordinary things
And people tend to pass you over
‘Cause you’re not standing out
Like flashy sparkles on the water
Or stars in the sky
But green’s the color of spring
And green can be cool and friendly like
And green can be big like a mountain
Or important like a river or tall like a tree
When green is all there is to be
It could make you wonder why
But, why wonder, why wonder?
I’m green and it’ll do fine
It’s beautiful and I think it’s what I want to be.

I think of that song when I pass the blue rainbow drawn on the driveway.
Whether blue chalk was all the little artist had or not does not matter.
It is blue and it will do fine.
It’s beautiful.

I used a chalk pavement picture to teach my children when they were young.
I wanted them to understand the importance of kindness and compassion.
When children are young, those lessons play out most often in their play.
How many times do we see a little boy or girl standing off in the corner alone?

That was unacceptable.
I wanted my children to know that and to recognize the problem.
I never wanted to see a little boy or girl standing off alone.
Not at our house; not on our driveway.

So I drew a circle with chalk.
The circle surrounded them as they stood inside it.
Since I was out of the circle, I was not part of the group.
With my foot, I was able to erase a section of the circle, step inside, and make the circle bigger.

That object lesson became a mainstay in our home.
Make your circle bigger, was something we would often say.
It was not just said; it was understood.
No one is left out; no one stands alone.

We would make the hand gestures as we pretended to erase an imaginary circle.
That simple motion was enough for them to understand.
Make your circle bigger.
Make your circle bigger.

When I pass the blue rainbow drawn on the driveway, I think beyond a chalk pavement picture.
I think of our culture.
I think about the way society views color.
I think particularly of the way society views the color of another person’s skin.

How I wish society could have an object lesson.
How I wish society would make their circle bigger.
How I wish color was truly not seen.
I actually pray to that end.

If I was able to place a human heart on my island in the kitchen, what would I see?
I would see a muscular organ about the size of a fist.
I would see four chambers: the left and right atrium and the left and right ventricle.
I would see coronary arteries running along the surface of the heart.

If I lined up multiple hearts along my kitchen island, what would I see?
I may see a heart that has been affected by a lifetime of smoking.
I may see a smaller heart because of a congenital defect.
I may see smaller arteries in some hearts rather than others.

What I would not see is color.
I would not be able to determine if the heart was taken from a white man or a black man.
I would not be able to tell if the person was Asian, Hispanic, or Native American.
I could not tell who the heart belonged to just by looking at the heart laid bare before me.

That seems to be our problem.
We never look at the heart.
We always look at the surface of things.
We always put ourselves in smaller and smaller circles.

The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. (1 Samuel 16:7)

The Lord looks at the heart.
The Lord created us to be this vast array of colors.
I imagine the joy He had when He created us.
Look at My palette; look at all this beauty.

We have marred the beauty of the Lord’s design because we fail to see the heart.
We fail to see that which makes us the same and see only that which makes us different.
We forget that inside our bodies, there is no color differentiation.
It is only on the outside that there seems to be a problem.

Why can’t we figuratively reach inside a person and see the heart that God created?
Why don’t we realize that we will not find color there?
I often think of a bag of M&M’s.
Despite the different color on the outside, there is only delicious chocolate on the inside.

I am praying for our culture.
Especially in this political landscape, color of skin seems to be merely a talking point.
People are put in categories and are being talked at, rather than talked to.
What if we simply imagined a room full of hearts?

What if we simply imagined a muscular organ the size of a fist?
What if we could only see a right and left atrium and a right and left ventricle?
What if we could trace the arteries with our finger?
What if a heart sitting in a chair was all we had to go on?

What difference would that make in our politics?
What difference would that make in the way we live our lives?
What size circle would we draw on the sidewalk?
How many erasures would we need to make with our foot?

Man looks at the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart.
It seems like we need to be more like Him and less like us.
It seems so.
It really seems so.

2 responses to “A Room Full Of Hearts”

1. I truly think prejudice (what you are talking about) is one of the biggest problems there is, causing people to be “out of the circle” because they have been taught that anyone who is different is bad. Why is variety bad? Look at nature, how God created all the varieties of plants, animals, flowers. We are amazed and moved by this but then put barriers up against our fellow human beings because of color, ethnicity, religion, etc. May God help us to keep love in our hearts for ALL of His creation!

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   • Sue,
     Making our circle bigger is so important. Everyone is made in the image of God and that alone makes us very special indeed.
     Gina

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