Jesus, the Son of GOD. Fully God and fully man, He came to earth to save us all. He could have chosen to come as a great king who ruled many nations and showed God's great majesty and power. He could have come with lightning bolts, thunder and fire to show that He was GOD. He could have come with a glorious entrance into the world and He could have had a slam big finish to leave it. He could have come in the way He deserved to come (being fully God), but He didn't.

He came in the womb of a young girl. He was born in a cave full of smelly animals and with nothing else to be laid in but a feeding trough with poky hay. He came as a little child and grew in stature and in wisdom, just like all of us. He was born into a poor family whose provider was a carpenter, and thus grew up learning to be a carpenter too. He came in humility, He was the servant of servants. He taught wherever He went about how to follow Him and how to live a life that honored God. He walked in the streets, risking ridicule from others, risking being stoned, risking being thrown into jail, and risking being killed because the words He spoke were of authority that God gave Him. He didn't teach how to be a great person, getting everything in life you want. He taught humility, to be a servant of servants, to give your all, to risk your life for God, to live a life radically following after His example. He taught sharing the cost of being a Christ-follower.
He hung out with fishermen, he dined with tax collectors and prostitutes, not caring what other people would think of Him. He touched lepers, He cast out demons, He raised the dead, He washed His disciples' feet, He walked for days at a time just to preach the Gospel. He stretched out His arms to love on children.. and then He stretched them out again to save us all. He was beaten, mocked, spit on, ridiculed and nailed to a cross because He loves you and me. Then He went to Hell for 3 days and He took our place but then defeated death and sits on a thrown next to His Father until He comes back.

He did it because of His mercy, grace, love, and compassion. He bent down low to serve, to help, to heal, and to love. He did it to stoop down and be a real person with real-life circumstances so that He could relate to us and show us that there really is hope.

*     *     *

I look around me as I climb onto the bus as people glance up at me and then quickly look away. I gently offer a "buenas tardes" as I pass through the aisle and I grab onto the bars up top so I don't fall on anyone as the driver pushes on the gas. I look around at brown faces and black hair that almost look the same at first glance, yet are so distinctly different once looked at for more than a second. Each one carrying their own set of life experiences and burdens, each with a mission and a goal to pursue.

*     *     *

I ask for 10 lbs of potatoes, 6 lbs of green beans, 6 carrots, 3 lbs of tomatoes, 10 onions, 5 peppers, and even more veggies and I hold out my quickly-filling bag to see her hard-working hands put them in there for me. She manages a crooked smile as I smile big at her and thank her as she hands me back my change.

*     *     *

I kindly tell her I'm not interested in buying anything from her as she holds out her arms to me, both full of necklaces and scarves. She's there everyday in the park trying to support her family and make ends meet, and every time I have to tell her I have no money or I don't need anything else. Disappointment flashes in her eyes because yet another person has told her 'no,' so she'll just have to try to find someone else.

*     *     *

I hear 'perdon' lightly whispered just after she bumps me with boxes filling her arms that hardly allow her to see around them and her hair almost completely hiding her face. The hard work is written all over her face, she's just ready for a break, to be done with all this, to just go home. I smile at her and she manages one back to me between breaths.

*     *     *

It's not even 10:30 and he rushes passed me, skipping ahead with his backpack held up high over everyone's heads, hands stained with blood and blisters from a hard morning and he bends down to help a little one and her mother up the steps and then he skips back on his way again as if everything was okay.

*     *     *

She groans at me and I have to look at her face to tell whether it was a laugh or a cry. She's smiling at me because I chose her to hold, to talk to, to love on for the morning. She tries to tell me stories, stories I can't even come close to understanding, but I listen anyways because who else is going to sit down and take the time to listen to her? I hold her in-between my legs instead of on my lap because she's soaked in urine, and likely has been for a long time and still some gets on me and that's okay because I'd rather that than for her to sit all alone in her chair like she does everyday.

*     *     *

I go over and sit her up in her 'crib' ("It's a crib if you sleep in it, it's a cage if you live in it," my dad always says and I know he's right). I gently rub her back as she gets better situated and then she just stares at me. I ask her how her day went, what life's been like since I saw her last even though I know she can't answer me back. I ask her anyways because she deserves to have an opinion, to be thought about, for someone to be patient with her. And I hug her and kiss her and whisper that she's beautiful even though I know she won't believe me because everyone else tells her otherwise.

*     *     *

She walks by me all the time, feet dirty and calloused from years of not wearing shoes. Baskets always on her head, a mission always written on her face, she always smiles at me with half of her teeth missing. She waves and wishes me a good day.

*     *     *

I close my eyes and I remember her so vividly. Half of her black face completely covered in scars and an eye missing because of stepping on a land mine while she was gardening just a couple years ago, she looks straight at me and tells me God has great plans for me and that He loves me and so does she.

*     *     *

He runs up behind me and musters all the courage he can and he touches my white skin just to check to see if I have painted it because mine is so very different from his. I bend down to my knees and I open my arms and even more courageously he runs into them and gives me a hug and I tell him I love him in English, even though I know he only speaks Luganda.

*     *     *

She gives me a beaded necklace she spent a few hours making and smiles at me, even though she's only 1 year older than me and her 4 year old son and her 2 year old daughter are now forced to live with her grandmother because her husband gambles all their money away. She looks at me as if I deserve better than her and my heart aches and I just want her to know that she deserves so much better than me..

*     *     *

She turns the corner and sees me and we had met once before and she kneels down and our eyes almost meet because she's so tall and she kisses my hand because it's a sign of respect and she feels like she owes it to me. I take her hand and kiss it and help her to stand up and give her a hug because she's the one who deserves respect, not me. Her husband died a few years ago and she's supporting her daughter alone and still gives almost everything she has because Jesus has radically taken hold of her and she wants to give as He gave.

*     *     *

All of these people and so many more fill my mind as I think of how much I am blessed. Each one of these people are so beautiful and each one deserves the whole world, yet they have nothing. Sometimes they have less than nothing and I sit here and complain because the fridge doesn't hold something that'll hit the spot for lunch. I look at all that is needed to be done to apply to a school, to be accepted, and then work to actually get there, and I think about my sister leaving for Uganda and me not knowing when I'll see her next, and I realize that this doesn't even compare to the problems and situations such as lives taken from AIDS and husbands getting eaten by alligators that these people face every single day. I look at my past and I get upset sometimes that it looks different than some of my siblings' pasts, and I realize that even that, the biggest and hardest thing I've ever gone through, doesn't even compare to what they have faced many times over in their lifetimes.
God has blessed me with so much in this life. He has given me so much more than I ever need and I could never deserve any of it. I don't deserve all that I have in my life anymore than any of these people I pass by; I am no better than them. So why would Jesus choose me, small, broken, inadequate Teisha, to lavish these gifts upon? I cannot give an answer because I just don't know. But I do know that because He has chosen me, I have been given much responsibility. It is my responsibility to reach those that these people can't for Jesus. It is my responsibility to proclaim His name wherever I go, to share hope that can't be found otherwise, to love with a love they have not known, to bend down and serve them, even when they think I am the one to be served. Because that is exactly what my Jesus did when He was here on earth, and no student is greater than his teacher. I must follow in His steps and do as He did. I must give my all to Him because He is the One who deserves it in the first place.

I have no idea how good at this I will be. In fact, I know that I will fail so many times in the future to come. But even so, I must push forward and keep trying even when I do fail. I must because, like I said, I must follow in His steps..

To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. -1 Peter 2:21