Help, I've Been Cerebrally Assualted!

Have you ever left an encounter with someone and felt that your brain has taken a beating?  I'm not talking about a healthy sparing match where each party leaves with satisfied bruising, this is more like being mentally mugged.  It happens far too often; a chance encounter while shopping, a meeting, a conversation at a social event.  One minute you feel all is right in the world, and the next you are cerebrally assaulted, someone's stupidity acting as a black hole and sucking all intelligent properties out of the conversation, gobbling up any intellectual contributions you offer and smothering them in nothingness.

It happens to me all the time.  I am not naturally a patient person; my selfishness fights the Holy Spirit from infusing me with this quality on a regular basis.  I find myself rolling my eyes, figuratively and literally, at all hours of the day.  If only people weren't so stupid, life would be better, more tolerable.

My Dad often has told me, "Stupid people need love too." To which I respond, "Maybe.  But not mine."

My natural tendency is to dismiss anything that isn't logical, intellectual, or constructive, and, honestly, the lack of those qualities equates a lack of value in my mind.  It isn't right, but that's my first reaction.  I spend a lot of energy trying to avoid these types of encounters, but with the world the way it is, there is no escape.  Frustrating.  But, I have come to the conclusion that there are only two postures I can take in these experiences...pride or humility. 

Naturally, I defer to pride.  I am prone to walk away feeling superior.  This is, however, not the Christ-like approach.  My usual response to a cerebral assault is to strike back, to put stupid in its rightful place, or to walk away aloof and dismissive. But, if I am to be more like Christ I have to learn to turn the other metaphorical brain-cheek.  Thanks, may I hear another of your ideas please?  And then try to listen without condescension.

It isn't just someone else's job to love stupid people.  It's mine too.  And, by loving them they become a little less stupid and a little more human...with flaws and failures and varying gifts just like me.  This will, no doubt, be a life-long journey for me.  Thankfully, our value to the Kingdom and the world is not based on our lack of intelligence or lack of affinity with people, but in a God, who possess those qualities infinitely greater than we ever could, who decided to love us anyway and breathe value into us through His Son.

Intelligence is important.  Very important.  You could argue that without it we all would die strange and humiliating deaths.  But, humility, patience, love...these keep people like me out of prison (from homicidal impulses) and bring people into the Kingdom of God, and that's what life's all about.  Well, maybe the prison thing is secondary, but you get my point.