People Don’t Know What You’re Thinking
“What is the source of our first suffering? It lies in the fact that we hesitated to speak. It was born in the moment when we accumulated silent things within us.””
Recently, I was at a Saturday morning women’s event at my mom’s church. Truth is, I don’t really like going to that church. I grew up in that church and experienced overt racism- like being called the N-word and being told I wasn’t welcomed- as a child by other children, and it made me feel alienated as I transitioned into the the teenage group. Though I have done a lot of healing, even sitting down with the pastor of the church, sharing my experiences and pain, and the Lord has brought renewal and the ability to forgive those who made my life hell, it doesn’t erase the bad memories.
As my mom and I were sitting at one of the many round tables, I sat next to a woman who remembered me from my youth group time at the church, but I didn’t remember her. She spoke to me, saying hello, and I tautly said hello back. For the next two hours, we women at the event could go around the church, praying or reading our Bibles- just being alone with God, setting our hearts towards the Lord, committing the year into His hands. After that two hours we reconvened for worship, answering a few questions with the women sitting at our tables.
That woman touched my arm and gently confronted me. I could feel her nervousness but there was something on her heart that she wanted to say to me. “Was it something God has prompted her to say?,” I thought to myself? She apologized to me, if she had done something to me when I was in the youth group. She did this because she remembers me of the time, and how I rejected authority, dropping the youth group altogether.
She went on to explain that she felt God had been wanting her to say that to me for a while. This simple bold move she made, that act of obedience to God tore down my tautness, and I could tell it brought some sort of freedom to my mom, who for years has known my experiences and mistreatment by that church, which is still her home church. She too has felt that pain. But what I want to say is: people don’t know what you’re thinking. I had no idea that she wanted to approach me but God knew what I need for further healing. Sometimes the key for someone’s healing is locked in our words. Sometimes we need to open our mouths and apologize, address something, or acknowledge a situation.
“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.””
I was the only Black kid in the children and youth ministry during my that time at that church, with the exception of a mixed-race boy. I suffered a lot trying to fit in and have friends and I was rejected a lot because of the color of my skin. In turn, I rejected the youth ministry and that church. It’s not easy being a Black kid, growing up in an all-White community. Actress Viola Davis has spoken extensively growing up as one of a few Black kids in a White Rhode Island community. That’s why I believe multi-cultural communities are best when everyone is represented.
But, whatever it may be- it can be a disagreement that happened years ago and you feel time has blown things over, or it can be my situation- sometimes things aren’t blown over. People may forget what you said, people may forget what you did, but we people never forget how someone made us feel. And when we reopen that can of worms, that past issue that we prefer to keep swept under the rug, especially when we do it out of the Lord prompting our hearts to speak up no matter how uncomfortable it is for us- then all forms of tautness can fall as it did that Saturday. It brings freedom for both sides and healing for the other.
This woman never hurt me when I was a youth, but her apology of, if she happened to have hurt me and she couldn’t remember, touched my heart to be more open at the table and participate and answer the group questions. She had no idea how much her acknowledging a time in my life that happened between twenty-one and twenty-six years ago brought some more healing.
We don’t know what people are thinking but sometimes we need to hear it. However, we don’t always get to hear it, we don’t always get the acknowledgement and apologies we’d like to have and if we don’t, we need to work through that hurt with the Lord and still forgive.
But, when we tell people what we’re thinking that’s when repentance- that’s when healing- that’s when sanctification- and that’s the words in the Lord’s prayer of: ‘may your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven’ can be lived out.