Judgement Free Zone

I'd like to prefaces this with saying I 'personally' feel I'm a pretty nonjudgmental person when it comes to about anyone or any situations. I always give people the benefit of the the doubt and give people chance after chance. However, maybe that isn't so true?

Let me explain...
Couple weeks ago I was in church singing along with the praise and worship team. Half way through a couple walked in with a baby. I had seen the girl before, but never her husband. They both stood as well and my first thought was, "aww they're cute". However, couple minutes later I noticed the shirt the guy was wearing. The church is "come as you are" -but on the back of his shirt was a shirtless Indian Chief hold a naked woman in his hands. In just a matter of seconds so many thoughts rushed through my head. The first being, "Are you serious! How degrading to the women in this church sitting behind you!"

Before I knew it, the pastor was closing out praise and worship. It dawned on me that I allowed something so stupid to take up my attention & my favorite part of the church service- the music! I started to think things like, "I missed the best part of the service because of this guy and his distracting and disrespectful shirt!"

Then I heard God say to me, "SERIOUSLY ALISON? WHO ARE YOU? This man came to church 100% humble wearing all he had". I put my head down and did some more thinking and praying as the service went on. I felt bad for taking all this time during worship that I could have been singing praises. Instead, I spent the entire praise and worship time hating and being critical. The ONE THING I say I don't do!

Then the next thought came to me, what if all of us who walked into church were wearing shirts with our sins from the past day, week, month, year? Would we even walk back into church? Umm probably not!

That's how the gym is right?! We hear it all the time, "your body reflects what you consume".
I have always viewed attending church and going to the gym as similar. They both seem to be a place where imperfect and broken people go. So many times, people looking in from the outside, view the people walking in as people who have their shit together. Yet, that couldn't be further from the truth. If we really take a step back, the people walking into church are TRULY BROKEN people recognizing they can't do this on their own. And the same for someone walking into the gym. They're humble people who are just dedicated to self improvement. They don't have their shit together, they're working on it. A lot can be learned about yourself when one stays focused and dedicated to a goal. The same with knowledge, it seems the more a person learns, the more you realize your have MORE to learn.
It's a PROCESS. A PROCESS of self improvement. Whether you're walking into church, the gym, a classroom... everyone has more to learn. The question is though, will we set our ego and pride aside to move forward?

Humbly moving forward...
I'm still learning...
Nowhere near perfect...