Who You Are Chapter 3

Chapter 02

Some Things Can Only Be Seen Indirectly

There are certain things we never actually see.

We have never seen the wind.

We have only watched leaves surrender to it.

We have never seen gravity; only the quiet certainty with which everything falls.

We have never seen love; only the way someone's face softens when another enters the room.

Some realities are known by their effects, not by direct observation.

Perhaps Presence belongs in that category.

Years ago, while sitting with a family whose husband and father was dying, very little was said.

There wasn't much left to say, the room had already heard every medical explanation.

Every hopeful possibility had been exhausted.

Words had become strangely unnecessary.

So, we simply sat together. Minutes passed. Maybe longer.

No one seemed interested in filling the silence.

Later, one of the family members quietly said, "Thank you for being here."

I've often wondered about those words; I hadn't solved anything.

I hadn't offered remarkable wisdom; I hadn't changed the outcome.

Why did my being there matter?

Perhaps because, in life's deepest moments, people are not looking for explanations, they are looking for someone who is not afraid to remain.

Remaining has become an undervalued gift.

We celebrate achievement; we reward productivity; we admire speed.

But love has always seemed strangely unhurried, it lingers, it listens,

It refuses to measure the value of a moment by how efficient it was.

Perhaps this is why some people change us without ever trying to.

They remain long enough for our souls to remember what peace feels like.

I have noticed something else…

When someone carries genuine peace, it rarely announces itself.

It doesn't compete for attention; it doesn't need recognition.

Peace simply creates space, it allows everyone else to breathe.

You can almost feel the room exhale.

Perhaps you've known someone like that.

Maybe a grandparent, a teacher, a nurse, a neighbor.

Someone whose greatest gift wasn't what they accomplished.

It was who everyone became while they were nearby.

Only recently have I begun reading an old story differently.

Two ordinary men stood before people who possessed every credential that mattered:

Education, position, authority, approval…

Everything suggested the educated men should have recognized superior arguments.

Instead, they recognized something much harder to explain,

they noticed courage, not loud courage, not defiant courage.

a settled courage, the kind that no longer needs to prove itself.

Then comes one of the quietest observations in Scripture:

"They took note that these men had been with Jesus."

Notice what the text does not say…

It doesn't say Peter and John were trying to imitate Jesus.

It doesn't say they quoted Him perfectly.

It doesn't even say they convinced everyone.

It simply says that someone noticed they had been near Him.

That sentence has begun changing the way I understand spiritual growth.

Perhaps becoming isn't mostly about trying harder.

Perhaps becoming is what naturally happens when we remain near love long enough.

There is an old piece of iron lying beside a magnet.

If left there long enough something remarkable happens.

The iron slowly begins behaving differently.

Not because it decided to.

Not because it attended a seminar.

Not because it was commanded to change.

Simply because it remained close.

I sometimes wonder if the human soul works more like that than we realize.

This thought has quietly changed the way I pray.

Less asking… More noticing.

Less striving… More remaining.

Less trying to become someone… 

More learning to live near the One who already is.

Perhaps transformation has always been less mechanical than relational.

Less like building… More like growing.

Sit With This...

Think of someone whose presence has made you feel more fully yourself.

Don't analyze why; don't explain it, simply remember.

Sometimes remembering is the first step toward recognizing what has been shaping us all along.