Think about this:  Sometimes we need to treat people like we’re meeting them for the first time, because in a way, we are.

But what about the people we’ve known for a long time, or even met before?  Doesn’t that count for something?  What about the experiences we’ve shared? The mutual trust we’ve built?  What we’ve gotten to know and enjoy about each other? The good impressions they’ve made on us?

Or what about the ways they’ve hurt us?  The ways they’ve let us down?  The things they’ve said or done that really annoy us?  The bad impressions they’ve made on us that have caused us to lose respect for them?  The ways they’ve broken our trust?

Yeah.  That’s the point.  Those positive, relationship-builder times?  Keep them in our hearts, thoughts, and memories when we encounter these people again.

But those negative, relationship-buster times?  Think about it.  None of us remains totally the same.  Every day, every minute, each of us makes choices.  Each of us either accepts or rejects outside influences.  Each of us thinks, feels, and acts in ways that shape us.  As a result, each of us changes in some way, either for the better or the worse.  No one remains stagnant.

This is bad news for those who are getting worse.  For a while they can put on a façade and appear to be that same sweet, kind, wonderful, person others have always known.  But that only works for so long before people detect it for what it is—hypocrisy.  No one likes hypocrisy.  People avoid individuals and groups they consider full of hypocrisy.  (Never mind if they’re hypocritical themselves, they still judge others for it!).

Let’s face it, in order to coast for any length of time, we have to be going downhill. This kind of “gravity” not only applies physically, but spiritually, emotionally, intellectually, and to our character, as well.

But the good news is that we can change for the better! We can take responsibility to step by step, choice by choice, by God’s enabling, develop new and better habit patterns.  We can forge new paths in our character and lives.

Take Paul in the New Testament, for example.  He started out as Saul—the guy who was “chomping at the bit” to stamp out the Christian “heresy” and kill off every believer wherever he could get his hands on them.  One day the Lord literally knocked him off his high horse and he became the number one PR guy for the same group he’d been trying to do away with!  (Acts 9:1-6)

But with his reputation, none of the believers wanted to get within spear-throwing distance of him.  Ananias, the first guy brave enough to approach Saul-turned-Paul only did so after a vision from the Lord. (Acts 9:10-16).  He’d heard all those bad reports about “Saul”, but the Lord assured him he’d be meeting a new man, Paul, for the first time.

Later, “When he came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples, but they were all afraid of him, not believing that he really was a disciple.” But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles.” (Acts 9:26-27). It took Barnabas to convince the disciples they were meeting the real, changed, Paul, for the first time.

Changed lives and people happen every day.  For example, a “town drunk” can become the director of a detox center who helps others get off the bottle.  In fact, I know of an instance where this actually happened.  Many years ago, an older guy was telling us his testimony of how he got his life turned around thanks to this detox center director, who we’d known as an alcoholic!

Prisoners who become ministers, either in or out of prison.  Former “ladies of the night” who become “children of the light…day” (1 Thes. 5:5).  Anyone who falls, repents, and gets back up again, is considered “righteous”.  (Prov. 24:16).  Including anyone we might look down on, disrespect, or just feel sorry for.  Even the ones who hurt us directly.

People change.  Why keep them in our hearts and minds in a bad-aftertaste sort of way? Let’s change the flavor of our relationship with them by meeting them for the first time—the way they’ve become.