Some people!

Hey everyone
If you know me the slightest bit you'll quickly find out that I truly enjoy Christmas, but I don't necessarily enjoy hanging out with my family for extended periods of time. If you would like an example and reason for why, here you go.
So a week before Christmas I went out to dinner with my grandparents, because I had not seen them for awhile and they wanted to visit with me. Needless to say all illusions that this was going to be a pleasant visit evaporated within the first five minutes. My Grandma is a very strong willed and firm individual, well sometimes she decides she needs to be right regardless the issue and she becomes abrasive. She asked me about my job, which is a source of great joy for me, and if you don't know what I do read the entry 2 posts ago and that'll bring you up to speed. I shared with her what my student's situation was and what my duties were and in the most condescending way she replied, "so in other words taxpayers are paying for that boy to have a babysitter follow him around all day." So in one sentence all my credibility as a professional had disappeared. To add insult to injury she says, "I know you don't have any control over that you're just doing the job you were given." Yeah, that made me feel better. Forget the fact that I feel purpose in what I do and the fact that the presence of that young boy, who will never be able to "support himself" as she put it simply changes everyone around him. I have had conversations with staff members at the school that have had their lives truly changed just by his example and his attitude. Her solution for "the problem" was to put this young man in an institution where he'll never be used as he has been. The truth of the matter is that maybe all of us need to be reminded that our lives are not all about us, maybe once in awhile we all need evidence that shows us that life happens in many different ways and we truly are fragile just as life is. Maybe we need to look beyond labels and see people as individuals with personalties, struggles, and resolve just as God sees them. Maybe people like my grandmother hide behind their solutions because they don't want to be reminded that life extends beyond their own boundaries and God stretches past their own small, infintesimal lives. I pity people like her and I pray that one day God shows her life in all its potential and I hope she's broken by it. I just hope it's not to late. For those of you that read this post I hope you realize that the God I serve in my opinion is an opened minded God and in order to follow him we too must be opened minded. I encourage you to stretch the boundaries in your life and try your patience in order that these qualities may abound in your heart so that your ability to see God will allow you to see him in the least likeliest places. That you could see him in mundane tasks like taking the garbage out, or in the beggar, businessman, or waitress you pass on the street. Or maybe you could find him in a fourteen year old mentally and physically handicapped boy like I have whose wisdom in life sometimes is leaps and bounds beyond my understanding of life and the God we serve. Seek him and you will find and when you find him, cling to him. In Jesus name I pray.