Lenten Reflection - Jenny Mitchell

“God does not see as a mortal, who sees the appearance. The LORD looks into the heart”.

(1 Samuel 7)

I find this reading to be surprisingly hopeful to read as a child of God, especially in this day and age where society drills into all of us that we need to lose weight, and watch what we eat in order to be healthy. However, the word says the Lord does “not judge from … appearance”. As it says in Samuel, God does not always choose the most beautiful or the most powerful to carry out His divine plan.

I was the second and youngest child always in the shadow of my brother who did not have to try very hard to excel. He was the Valedictorian of his high school class, I graduated second to last; he graduated Summa Cum Laude from College – I just graduated.

But at that point in my life, my brother moved on, got married and they moved to the east coast. I was “on my own” to make decisions in my life and no longer had to worry about being directly compared to my brother that I admired so.

I got my Master’s degree in Social Work and now work in a school filled with only Special Needs Children. It is challenging work, and demanding work. These students have opportunities in this day that they never would have had historically. Even medically fragile children can now interact with friends and smile when they do activities together; children with Cerebral Palsy can learn to walk and talk, children with Autism can learn to control their behaviors and grow up to get a job, children with emotional disabilities who are suspended and expelled from their home schools are given the opportunity to learn.

As Samuel says, “Not as man sees does God see, because man sees the appearance but the Lord looks into the heart”.

My husband, Jim, is also a social worker – we met while studying at Washington University, George Warren Brown School of Social Work. When we got married, the priest said at our wedding that Jim and I were going to do the work of Jesus as social workers. That has always meant a lot to me.

We most certainly are not royal, as David grew to become, but I do feel the “spirit of the Lord” in my heart and soul every day.

Jenny Mitchell