Loving Others ~ Shrek was Right...

 

Shrek was right.

Some reading this just thought, “What?”

Others just thought, “Who?!?”

Still others stopped reading all together.

Wait….come back!! 

Shrek is a cartoon character from a 2001.  He is an ogre who prefers to live alone, but soon has all these fairy tale creatures who have been banished from their homes are now taking up residence in his swamp.  Shrek embarks on an adventure to restore his life and privacy by getting the fairy tale creatures their homes back.  Along the way he meets a donkey.  One of my favorite exchanges is between Shrek and the donkey.  The donkey is asking Shrek why he isn’t nicer.  Here is how the conversation unfolds:

Shrek : For your information, there's a lot more to ogres than people think.

Donkey : Example?

Shrek : Example... uh... ogres are like onions!

Donkey : They stink?

Shrek : Yes... No!

Donkey : Oh, they make you cry?

Shrek : No!

Donkey : Oh, you leave 'em out in the sun, they get all brown, start sproutin' little white hairs...

Shrek : NO! Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers... You get it? We both have layers.

Donkey : Oh, you both have LAYERS.  You know, not everybody like onions, Shrek. CAKE! Everybody loves cake! Cakes have layers!

 

Perhaps it is funnier if you watch it.  You can click above to watch it.

 

My point…and I do have a point…is that Shrek is right.  People are like onions.  Yes, they will make you cry…and we all have layers.  The person you are trying to love, the other, has layers too.  Why the other person does what s/he does is not always clear to you or even to that other person.  I know this, because I don’t always know why I do what I do.  Or to quote the Apostle Paul (after all this is a faith meditation – not a movie review), “For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:19).  In the translation according to Wes, “Why, O God, am I such a bonehead sometimes?” 

 

Because we have layers.  Because to peel back those layers is difficult and demanding.  Because we all want change ~ we just want others to go first.  The layers of your life and those of others are made up of experiences and encounters.  The layers of your life come from the moment you took your first breath.  The layers are not always evident or easily understood.  There are moments something someone said to me in my first church still come into my mind years later.  There are moments that I am still trying to prove something to someone who I met years ago and will never see again.  There are lessons I learned along the way in life that are no longer true, but I can’t seem to let go.

 

If this is true for me, what about my neighbor?  What about the person who I encounter today?  What about that family member?  Fellow church member?  What about the one who just yelled at me and honked their horn?  What about that one who will give me unsolicited feedback?  Those who want to armchair quarterback your life?

 

There are so many layers to our lives.  To try to love ourselves ~ with all our mixture of mystery and messiness ~ is enough.  To add, loving our neighbors? 

 

By the way, spoiler alert, in the end Shrek decides it is better to be in community, even if some of the fairy tale characters annoy him, then to be all alone.  I agree.