I struggle with pride.

Such a challenge it is to be humble.

Once I ran into this guy, *Marc, from primary school, on a bus. Already growing facial hair on his upper lip and sporting a permanent snail-trail like line of drool at the bottom of his mouth, he was quite the outcast. In year 6, when everybody was slowly warming to the idea that boys could possibly be germ-free, I took the liberty of befriending him since no one else would, thinking I was so charitable and selfless for my martyr act of kindness.

I invited him to play with my "group" one lunchtime. All we did was sit in a circle and eat our sandwiches. Being of Lebanese descent, he pulled out his elaborate tupperware containing homemade vine leaves, baklava and sheets of ethnic bread. Now aside, my school was quite multicultural, and my best friend was also Lebanese, so this wasn't foreign to me. However Marc's outcast status was proven that minute, when he grabbed the many contents of his lunchbox and held them tight in a ball with his fist, to which he followed by stuffing it all into his mouth, like a ravenous and untamed pig-animal.

Fragmented pistachio nuts, flakes of pastry and olive oil dribbled down his school shirt (they were yellow) and us being an entire group of dainty little asian/lebanese/greek school girls, we cried out in our disgust and horror.

I would like to say that this memory of Marc at eleven-years-old was not triggered when I ran into him that day, but my thoughts-and-memory filter betrayed me. Once the ill table mannered, unhygenic eleven year old made me want to run a km, but now, looking at him at twenty years of age I realised there was a change in him. He had shaved off his mo, yet kept a triangle of fuzz on his chin for stylistic purposes, which I approved of, and his mouth seemed pretty dry-spit free and clean. He talked with a deeper voice, and I took note of his protruding Adam's apple while he described life as a first year apprentice electrician.

Then it came - his years of depression, of finding friends to accept him since he'd never really had any, the death of his grandfather whom his bond with was unbreakable, then primary school, and being sad at nine years old, ten years old and eleven years old and how it all spiralled downward from there.

You would think my compassion for him would have increased. Honestly, I really enjoy it when unexpected persons suddenly pour their hearts out to me, and begin bearing their souls, reaching towards me for comfort and security and wisdom.

But I felt awkward.

So, so awkward. Comfort? Security? Wisdom? We were on a public bus! If anything, I wanted him to stop talking so openly and being so vulnerable. I hadn't seen this guy in nine years and suddenly he was dictating his autobiography to me on a main stage! (Melodramatic, I know). Then he asked for my contact details. I thought it so pathetic. I gave him a false e-mail address and told him to definitely email me and I would reply as soon as it was possible.

What made it worse was when I initiated a hug at the end of our impromptu meeting. "It was so lovely running into you," I said as I hugged him.

I am such a horrible, heartless witch.

What the hell gave me "cooler person" leverage that afternoon? I wonder how Marc would feel if he read this blog, knowing that I'd given him fake contact details? Or worse, publicly declaring that I thought him "lesser" than myself at many points in my youth? He was a victim of our self-seeking, self-serving culture, which shuns unpracticed table manners and all the other 'required' social skills. Where was my desire to be like Christ that day?

My challenge to myself is humility. Knowing there are blotchy crimson stains seeping through my very soul, that they are disgusting and gangrenous to God - but, because He is love in its wholeness and entirety, He chooses to look past them by placing them on his perfect, beloved Son Jesus.

It is so unfair and I don't deserve this grace.

Forgive me Lord, for knowing what I was doing yet still choosing to be so heartless.

Let us fly away tonight,
Heavily under prepared
on clouds of white.
In your jacket lapel a pocket knife,
to sever ties with all the strings of life.

You only wanted one bar of soap
But the shop didn't sell soap in single folds.
So you had to buy the four-pack
And in a way
You still don't think
that's enough to wash all your sins away.

And you fill the vacuum
With many, lovely shapes
Made by you.
Why does my heart bleed?
Why do I still long?
You ask,
before a God you've never known.

Are you happy,
Are you fine?
How are things going in your life?
Do you climb furniture
leading to nowhere
and when you get there,
do you build hope?

Well there is grace
In our ungrace.
We can have what's unfair
Though we deserve what's fair.
How I thank God for my fleeting life
He permits its restoration...
in Jesus!

And my very breath is short if not for You.
And my very breath is short if not for You.

Only by the blood of His Son,
Jesus Christ.
Only by his grace.

Only by the blood of His Son, Jesus
do we taste freedom
to know Him,
to love him.

Only by the blood of His Son.
Only by his grace
do we know Jesus.

Do you know Jesus?