Leaving the airport parking lot, I was about to pay the parking fee when the man behind the gate’s window look at me and asked, “Are you from India?”
I said no. Then he looked at me again and said, “But you look like one.” I thought it was a very nice compliment due to my love for India. India is one of the places you will never forget—the colors, the food, the beautiful dresses, the jasmine flowers on the streets, the smell of curry and chapatti, the languages, the music and the amazing architecture.
As I talked to the man behind the window, all these images and senses came to mind. I thanked him for the compliment, saying that part of me is in India. He smiled and offered to share his last chapatti with me.
As I drove home that day, his words stayed in my mind: “You look like one.” Every day, many times a day, we look like something to someone. Every day we make an impression. The word impression means to stamp or form, or figure by impressing…imprint… So the question today is what impression are we leaving on the hearts and minds of those we come in contact with.
The Bible says, “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (John 4:13). They recognized them as followers of Jesus. They saw Jesus in them.
There are many—in cities, in small towns, on your street, in your place of work—looking for someone who has been with Jesus. Have you been with Jesus? Do you “look like one” who knows Him? How can you “look like one”? Here are three ways we can look more like Him: by loving to spend time with Him, by copying Him in everything we say and do, and by relying upon Him. In this way we will be transformed into His likeness.
Let the mind dwell upon His love, upon the beauty, the perfection, of His character. Christ in His self-denial, Christ in His humiliation, Christ in His purity and holiness, Christ in His matchless love–this is the subject for the soul’s contemplation. It is by loving Him, copying Him, depending wholly upon Him, that you are to be transformed into His likeness. {AG 293.4}
My prayer is to be like Jesus. This must be our ultimate goal. I do not know whether I will have an encounter today, a moment when someone will look at me and say that I “look like one” —Indian, Brazilian, Turkish. I don’t know. But one thing I do know, I want to walk with Jesus so that when people look at me they will recognize that I “look like one,” act like one, speak like one who has been with Him.
Raquel Arrais is associate director of Women’s Ministries for the General Conference.
Note: To view this week’s world church prayer requests, click here!