So often people talk about how somebody looks like another person. Perhaps it’s a celebrity, or a younger/older version of a person or even that they look like a parent or grandparent. Sometimes I see these similarities and other times I think the person I’m talking with has a peculiar way of looking at people…. More often than not, the similarity comes down to one or two features and sometimes it’s not even physical. Instead it’s their mannerisms or a “look” that they give that reminds you of someone. This reminder is important. Very rarely do we comment about how someone reminds us of someone we dislike or see similarities in the negative ways someone behaves.
Instead we see the things we admire in one another.
Last night Mila saw her birth father for the first time in over a year. The connection between them was immediate. She doesn’t warm up to people immediately. There are multiple people who see her every week that still don’t get a warm greeeting when she sees them. And yet, the way she looked at him, the way she went to him with no fear, the way they looked at each other. You could see the resemblance. It felt like they had loved each other without even seeing each other. It was beautiful.
I often wonder about a story from Genesis. In it we’re reminded that as humans we are made in the image of God. In his book, Wild at Heart, John Eldridge thinks that since God doesn’t have a body, the image referred to here is our hearts. Last night, I saw the heart of God when I saw Mila and Sasha together. The physical resemblance was there but more than that, the way they loved was the same too.
They were the image of God.
And when people remind us of the things we admire, those things too, are the image of God.
Justin Elder is a managing editor at nonpropria.com. His loves include iPads, Disney World and of course his two daughters and wonderful wife. If you can’t catch him at home binge watching on Netflix or an NBA game, he’s most likely playing with the girls in the backyard.
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