Your Future Plants Will Succeed

You just gotta love fortune cookies. Most of the time, the "wisdom" they offer is so random. Other times you question whether or not what is on the paper inside is actually a fortune...maybe a proverb but not a fortune. And are they ever really specific...the ones I always get seem to be so generic...empty platitudes to wish me joy and prosperity.

The above title was a "fortune" I received a few weeks ago. I'm not sure if it is a sign that I might have a future career in the farming industry or if they knew about my wife's lack of a green thumb. For some reason I think it was intended to communicate something else to me. Today, I got a "two for the price of one" special as there were two pieces of paper in my cookie. The "mysterious" thing is that they were both similarly applicable. One offered this nugget "You will enjoy doing something different this coming weekend." The other simply said, "Do something unusual tomorrow." This cookie must have had some inside sources because after all tomorrow is the "live" show of the Charity League Follies, and it is both unusual and different for me! Hmmm....

Sometimes I wonder if as Christians we attempt to offer people the "good news" equivalent of fortune cookies. We've been trained to say and do certain things when we encounter people that what we end up sharing with them is as generic and out of place as a fortune claiming "Your future plants will succeed." We offer them empty sayings that don't provide any more depth or meaning than a shallow "do something unusual tomorrow." Does what we offer connect with where they are right now...in the valley of darkness, in the depths of despair, in the frustrations of making ends meet, or in the anxiety of approaching the end of their rope? I often laugh at the humor in random fortunes. But what does the world around me do? How do people see me? Do they laugh at the "out-of-touch randomness" I offer or do they see a fellow human being who simply understands the grace of God and longs to invite them to swim in its depths?

Much more than just a generic piece of paper in a cookie, may I daily look for opportunities to connect in deeper ways with people who are looking for the love of God. And much more than any empty fortune, may those around me see a Christ follower, a forgiver and a friend!