Don’t Shoot The Messenger.

Insight 63 | I’ve found that no matter how hard you try, there are simply a few ideas, concepts, or truths that can take YEARS for us to understand and get through our thick skulls.

Whether that be life-defining instances that change your course, decisions made by others that impact your trajectory, or certain questions you have that are waiting on you to grow in age and understanding, part of the human condition is the fact that hindsight is twenty-twenty. 

In wrestling with reality, I’ve noticed our pride and egos so easily fool us into missing what's “right in front of us,” and by extension, often cause us to harm the very people trying to save us from the potholes we're about to fall into.

We’d prefer to throw temper tantrums, end friendships, blame others, or reach faulty conclusions rather than swallow the truth about what we don’t want to admit. When instead we should be giving thanks to the people brave and loving enough to stand in our way when we continue to push them out of our lives.

I think that sometimes we all need a little wake-up call to remember: You might not like someone's message, but no matter what, we should never shoot the messenger, because they might just be the only ones who can see what you can’t.

Growing up, I was blessed to have many liberties others may have only wished for. My curfew was flexible, I was given unwavering support to try new things, and I was often encouraged to have time to do “unproductive” activities because my family has a strong belief in making time to practice not only a work ethic but a rest one as well.

On the other hand, I was also blessed with a few extremely strange rules that many of my friends laughed at and could never seem to understand. I was never allowed to use toy or virtual guns, I was not permitted to read Harry Potter, and, in my opinion, the silliest of all, I was banned from playing the widely popular game Subway Surfers.

Until recently, I thought what I just mentioned (as well as many more) were interesting parenting choices that constricted me and were pointless. But, as explained in the introduction of this article, I now realize that with twenty-twenty hindsight, these decisions were not only sound, but are some of the BEST things that could have ever happened to me.

Yes, it may seem extreme to some, but I'm serious when I say I am grateful for my parents' decisions. While I'm not saying these parenting choices are for everyone, slowly but surely, as I have grown in maturity and understanding, I realized these decisions were actually in my best interest. 

Now, my no guns and anti-Harry Potter examples are mostly self-explanatory, as in you can perhaps see why some families would prefer their young children not engage with this type of content, but, if you are like me, you may be wondering why I was never allowed to play the “seemingly harmless” mobile running game, Subway Surfers. 

For those who may be unfamiliar, in the game, you take the perspective of a young kid who has been engaging in illegal graffiti while playing in the train yards. You have just been spotted by law enforcement and have chosen to make a run for it. The point of the game is to scramble along the path, while avoiding various obstacles, and trying “not to get caught”.

Once again, this may seem harmless at first, but the truth is that there are countless profound parallels and deep metaphors one can draw from this game and our own lives. One must take a moment to consider the events unfolding and realize how questionable the instance is. Besides the fact that the character is engaging in a clear misdemeanor by vandalizing public property, the game leads us to believe the cop chasing us down is the enemy, when in reality, nothing could be further from the truth.

As the player, we’re led to think the policeman is trying to ruin our fun and spoil our creativity, but that's not what's going on at all. Instead, the cop is the only one trying to stop us from getting hit by a train!!! 

DON’T YOU REALIZE! We were in grave danger, foolishly playing by the train tracks, and yet when someone came to help us out, we ran TOWARDS the oncoming trains instead of into the arms of safety.

It's a mind-bending revelation and one that applies to us. We often engage in harmful behavior that others are trying to save us from, but we quickly turn on them and make them our enemy when they should be our heroes!

I’ve been thinking this idea over more than ever, as a friend of mine texted me a quote this week that read: “Most people aren’t in your way, they’re on the way.”

See, we often understand things with perfect clarity, not in the here and now, but rather when we look back on them years later. But those very same moments are often clear to those around us, our parents, our siblings, our mentors, friends, teachers, leaders, and yet we STILL choose to ignore their warning!

It’s true, you might not always “like” some of the people trying to get your attention, but I think we all sometimes need the reminder to pay critical attention to what they’re saying because it may just be exactly what we need to hear and end up paying incalculable dividends in our lives.

To really drive this truth home, I'd ike to share a hysterical Biblical account of this very phenomenon in action.

In scripture, there is a small narrative that has always caught my attention: that of a man named Balaam, someone motivated by self-profit and greed, who also possessed the gift and capacity to communicate prophetically with God. Although his heart was misaligned with the Lord's, we do have a small account of his life in which one of the most interesting little stories appears. 

On a trip to speak with the enemies of Israel, Balaam's donkey stopped in its tracks and refused to move. The donkey could see that in their path stood an angel of the Lord with his sword drawn, and so he turned off the road and into a field. Balaam, furious at this act, attempted to beat the donkey back onto the walkway, and it is here that God allows the donkey to open its mouth to speak in its defense. While it had clearly seen the angel and turned away in respect, Balaam had been blind to it, and it wasn't until the donkey spoke up that the Lord opened Balaam's eyes to what was right in front of him the entire time.

While it's a short story, the meaning here is profound and has stuck with me in an unusually deep way since I last encountered it. See, sometimes it’s the most unexpected of figures who are the ones aware of the most important thing that most of us can’t even see in that moment.

In the end, it is we who suffer when we mentally block them out and never give them a chance to speak. 

Sometimes, it's the donkeys who see the angels first.

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I know many of us have choices we wish we could remake. So many of us have pasts we pray we could change or moments we would have done differently. Hindsight is twenty-twenty; today feels blurry.

But the good news is that we don’t have to do this life alone, and we would make it a lot easier on ourselves if we were all a bit more willing to listen when another tries to speak.

At the end of the day, it is we who must endure the pain from our own decisions when we childishly keep playing on the train tracks, or ignore the talking donkeys in our lives. And while it might take everything we have to push back against our ego and shut up for just a moment, if we are willing and do so, we might realize that:

Those in our way are there for a reason… They are “on your way” to becoming a better you.

In certain moments, it may feel like some people are acting like a “donkey,” or even chasing you down like the policeman from Subway Surfers, but remember! Sometimes they’re the ones trying to save us from the angels we can’t see or the trains barreling our way. 

We must all be more intentional to stop, pray, listen, and THEN act so that when it's all said and done, we hear the message, avoid the danger, and Don’t Shoot The Messenger.

- Making The Most Of Being Curious

Daniel J. Cuesta

Sources:

• We aren't always aware of the simple truths in front of us: Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the road with his sword drawn. So he bowed low and fell facedown. - Numbers 22:31

• Listen before labeling:  To answer before listening—that is folly and shame. -  Proverbs 18:13

• Who are we?: “Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought…we all have different gifts…” -  Romans 12:3-6

• Sometimes it's the children who know more: You have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. - Luke 10:21 

• Check The Heart, Not What They Drive: The Lord does not look at the things people look at… the Lord looks at the heart. 1 Samuel 16:7