What Jesus Looks Like

I Know What Jesus Looks Like!

About three and a half years ago, my brother John, a pastor in Texas, called to ask that our family pray for his newest grandson, born at exactly twenty-four weeks of pregnancy, weighing only 1 pound 8 ounces. 

During the six months that Damian was in the hospital, the NICU, or neo-natal intensive care unit, became a second home to not only my sweet niece and her husband, but also to my brother and the rest of his family.  At every opportunity, John would drop by the hospital, or, sometimes, during the middle of the night, he would slip in to watch Damian and to quietly and unobtrusively pray over his incubator.

Today, Damian is a happy, loving, and sensitive three year old whose very presence reminds us of God’s great grace and mercy.  Recently, his mom was bathing him and talking about Jesus.  As Tiffany told him how Jesus lives in Heaven, loves him, and looked over him in the hospital, Damian confidently looked at his mom and said, “I know that.”  She asked him how he knew that, and he told her that he had seen Jesus in the hospital.  When Tiffany heard that, she smiled and asked Damian what Jesus looks like.  Without any hesitation, Damian replied, “He looks like Papaw.”

As I thought about those many hours that John had watched Damian, sung to him, and prayed for him, tears filled my eyes as I realized that Damian’s first glimpse of Jesus with skin on was intertwined with his grandfather’s ministry of love to him in the first few months of his life.  Matthew 5:16 exhorts us to let the light of the Lord Jesus so shine through us that others will see that light and glorify our Father in heaven.  Suddenly, I heard a question echo through my heart:  Gerry, has anyone ever seen Jesus when looking at you?   

Lord, may I live my life in such a way that your ministry to others through me will show them Jesus and His love – with skin on!

© 2011 Gerry Sisk

(11/16/11)