Shape Shifters and Souls

I was recently looking over some email that a friend of mine had sent me. Attached to it was a You tube series on of all things "Reptilian Shape Shifters" Apparently someone has come up with a techinally witty way of taking an ordinary video clip and enhancing it with realistic special effects to make it look like shape shifting is taking place. I was watching this clip in disbelief and blinking my eyes to make sure that I was seeing it the way that it was truly happening. Yes the beautiful blonde reporter was communicating some terrible tragedy of disaster with the news anchorman, when all of a sudden, her eyes began to change shape, shifting back and forth from some reptillian creature to her human persona. I kept watching the video and then saw the scales and the outline of a reptile under the facade of the woman's countenance. I really found the whole experience rather unique and also disturbing.

I wondered what would happen if I were able to do that with my twenty one year old son, perhaps when he lets his laundry pile up in the kitchen or leaves his dirty dishes in the sink, that shape shifting act could really come in handy. Then, my mind began to drift to an incident that I encountered with my husband regarding an issue that has been irritating me for the last several months. I pictured him sitting in his usual posture on the sofa with the remote control in hand, and us engaged in yesterday's annoying and anger inducing conversation. I imagined my face serene and controlled with poise until he said the magic word that would provoke me to angst, now I added that clever little trick of shape shifting to my countenance and WHAM! my husband flies off the sofa and is doing everything he can to apologize, placating me and keeping me from eating his face off! Interesting to say the least.

I kept pondering the usefulenss of shape shifting and then the realization came to me that I am indeed a shape shifter of sorts. I carry the image of God inside of my soul and when I speak to others , I reflect his image to them. I am made in the likeness of God, and my responsiblitly in this life is to get to know him on a deep level and to have a satisfying relationship with him and to communicate this to others. Unfortunately, in this life living for God is a foreign concept to those who don't know him, and we are aliens in a strange land. Liken that to the shape shifters that supposedly inhabit the population that we know nothing about, and you have the complete illustration of Christians in today's modern society. As a Christian, I have experienced firsthand those who are lost and don't know it, and they look at me like I am an alien when I tell them that Jesus thinks that they are amazing and he loves them madly and that God has a wonderful plan for thier life. Jesus was truly alien even though he was fully man . He also was fully God and people had no idea that the Kingdom of God was standing right next to them when he walked the earth. He had the body of a man and the heart of a King. He saw the beginning middle and end of the story. He was God travelling incognito to a lost and dying world. He revealed himself to the ones who truly longed for him and made it their desire to follow him and place him first in their lives. The bible says "I am a stranger to my brothers, an alien to my own mother's sons." (Psalm 69:8) Jesus said that he came to divide families against one another and parents against their children. (Matthew 10:34) As Christains, we walk as aliens in a world that rejects the unfamilliar. We must remember our responsiblitiy to God and his kingdom. Regardless of how we are viewed to those we meet, we are image bearers for the Lord and his image must be clearly viewed in our lives so that that those lost in the darkenss can finally see the light and conform to the image of Jesus Christ that they see reflected in our souls.