September 2008

We're all a Box of Crayons

Do you ever wonder why we meet the people we do? Why our lives come to intertwine with another's? I was pondering this and I have come to think we are each like a box of crayons. Instead of a variety of colors though, our box is full of one color, just one. When we walk in life and we form relationships, we hold out our hands and trade our color with another. Some may be yellow, or red, or purple, some even black or blue. One by one, the crayons in our box are replaced by the crayons of those we've known. In the end, we hold a rainbow of crayons to color our lives with.

We are meant to know the people we do, we are meant to spend time with those we find around us. Their lives have something beautiful to teach us, that will shape us and give us the wisdom we need to learn. Their hearts will be a light to us. After all, light is made up of all the colors together, each one blending together, each one visible and lovely. Do you think that is why God made us so different, each unique? Do you think that is why God gave us different preferences, likes and dislikes? Yes, we have things in common, but we have gifts to give each other as well, things we don't have without knowing our friends.

You see, our differences are beautiful things, we do need each other, we need the pieces of life one another has. We are complete in ourselves, yet we are also complete when in relationships with others. It's one of those great paradoxes where truth is held in the tension between two contradictory things, being complete in ourselves and complete in a whole other way with each other. In my own life, I have come to see this time and time again, how this person in my life has brought something I've needed, that color I needed to make the eyes brown, the flowers pink, or the sky blue, my life brighter. Not all of the colors are pleasant, sometimes they are hard to take, but even those, bring the contrast we need, even those bring the lessons we need to learn. I've colored with these crayons in my hands, danced even, and each time I am amazed how God has brought just the person into my life I needed at that moment.

My prayer for you is that you will find the gifts in those around you, that you can see the color they have brought into your life, and perhaps even tell them so. May your lives be filled with color. I'm really glad you've colored into mine.

Last Updated: 12/30/2011