Jesus and the Green Hat

Bad smells, wrinkles, wheelchairs. These are not a few of my favorite things. Still, I found myself in the midst of them recently in a little place called Vista Ridge Nursing Center. I was singing along to the sweet tones of one by the name of Sam, and this Sam knew a secret. Unbeknownst to me, I was to speak that day to the ragged residents of Vista Ridge. In his negligence, Samuel forgot to ask me, and as he called my name, I wondered what I might say to such a group. I stood being gored by twenty pairs of aged eyes, and I began to preach a little sermonette from John 9.

I have one policy that I follow when I speak. I do not just talk because I am asked to do so. I speak because I have to, because I have something worth saying. I believe in what I say with all my being, and as I spoke to the little group of wrinkled eyes, I did everything I could to establish hope in their hearts with my words, with my own eloquence. In my impromptu attempt at hope-giving, I mentioned that a lady sitting in front (Ms. Scott) had a pretty hat on, that I really liked it. Covering her white hair was a green knit cap, a beautiful hat. She responded with a bashful smile and a tap to her greenish crown. Wrapping up my talk, I just knew that my words would surely help the haggard eyes who watched and the tired ears who listened.

I prayed the closing prayer that afternoon, and immediately, I went to speak to each of the elderly people present. I soon found myself in front of Ms. Scott. I knelt down beside her and gently held her hand, and looking up at me she said, "I'm glad you came today." I responded with a thanks for listening and prepared to move on. But, she held on tighter. Touching her cap she whispered, "I'm so glad you came," and a single tear rolled down her cheek. She let go of my hand and looked away. I was stunned. I stood up, and with my hand on her shoulder, I told her I loved her and was glad to meet her.

Ms. Scott, slightly smelly, wrinkled, and bound to a wheelchair, didn't need my eloquence or my words of hope. She needed a little hope in flesh. She needed a hand to hold and a compliment to warm her.

"Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me" Matthew 25:34-36. If you will permit me one extra line, "I wore a green hat and you cared."

God help me when I so stubbornly believe that my ability to speak is my ministry. Sometimes, I neglect to see the hope in a smile, or the love in a hand held. Maybe my best preaching is done outside of a pulpit. Maybe it is best done in those smelly places filled with green hats and single tears, those places filled with Jesus.

This Ship Has Sailed

I would marry G.K. Chesterton. Seriously. His book, Orthodoxy, literally changed my life, and very few books can make that claim. In it, he wrote a parable about a man who grew sick of England, his home, so he built a boat to escape the boring green plants and the dull gray cliffs on the shores of his domesticated country. As the boat sailed away from the shores of Britain, a storm attacked the vessel, and the young Brit became lost at sea. After several days of purposeless floating, the schooner landed safely on a foreign land with beautiful green plants and strong gray cliffs, and the man was thrilled. He found exactly what he searched for, an exotic land, full of adventure. However, the land turned out to be England, which he now viewed in a completely different light.

I have known all about love and service for my whole life, about selfless sacrifice and humility, and I could quote the exact scriptures that teach about the love of Christ. Minister after minister preached to me about the feet scrubbing that Jesus did, but it just seemed so old and distant. But, at the beginning of last summer, as a young girl cried in my arms because of her guilt, all I could do was comfort her and listen. When I visited a widow’s house and she broke into tears because of the pain in her heart, I could give her nothing but my hand to hold, and I felt a love outside myself. I contemplated what it was I had been feeling, and I thought about the power of simply listening with no desire but to help. Just when I thought I had found something brilliant and new, I was back at John 13 starring at the old familiar basin and cloth with a Savior scrubbing feet.

Love is no longer a theory, but it is a vibrant part of my life. It is not a self help idea but a true expression of gratitude. I left what I knew to find something better, yet in the end, I was back where I started. I no longer follow a foreign man’s theology, for I have made Christianity my own story of love, a story of rediscovery.

Jimmy Stewart, you speak to my soul.

As part of my Christmas Eve tradition, last night I watched It's a Wonderful Life. And it really is.

The Evil Giant... Me?

I was reading some material by Daniel Goleman, a psychologist. He spoke of a conversation he had with an imprisoned serial killer known as the Santa Cruz Strangler. The man is almost seven feet tall, and he has and IQ of just over 160, making him a certifiable genius. The one question that burned in Goleman's mind was "How could you have done it?" The strangler admitted that he killed in a very personal way, so Goleman further prodded, "Did you not feel any pity for these poor people?" The murderer paused and answered in a matter-of-fact tone, "No, If I had felt even a hint of their distress, I would have been rendered incapable of my actions. I had to turn that part of me off."

That is so cold and calculated, and I think that, at first glance, an evil giant genius with a capacity for sociopathic behavior seems almost like science fiction to me. Still, his admission that he had to turn "that part" of his conscience off is fascinating. I can see myself in that. It seems possible, if not probable, that every human being is born with the capacity for empathy, but at some point we make a semiconscious decision to just turn it off.

I am from a small town, and there are very few homeless people here. However, when I have been to large cities in America, I have noticed many people just living on the streets. I can remember as a young child visiting Philadelphia, PA. As I walked around with my parents, we passed a small lot of grass just off the sidewalk, and on this little oasis of green lay nearly twenty dirty and disheveled homeless people. I was unfamiliar with the concept of homelessness at the time, so I was horrified to discover that these human beings lived outside. When I went to Europe, I saw beggars lining the streets, and as much as it bothered me in the beginning, by the end of my trip, I hardly noticed them.

I look at the evil giant genius, and I see a barbarian. Yet, I am the barbarian. I have done everything within my power to turn off that part of me that pities. I might make up excuses like "They should just get a job" or "They just want more booze" instead of "It is my job to love" or "They are slaves to addictions that I cannot even imagine." My forced ignorance of the pain of others might have begun with the extreme cases of homelessness, but it has filtered into most pieces of my everyday life.

Before Jesus ever walked this earth, the famous Rabbi Hillel was asked by an outsider to sum up the entire Jewish faith. He replied, "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Law; the rest is commentary; go and learn." Jesus agreed. What do you think Hillel meant when he added, "go and learn." Study of the Torah is surely important, but I think it was more or less a command to "see for yourself." Just try it, and I think it is that simple. Each one of us has the capacity for empathy for compassion for good, and I honestly believe that this part of us is dying to come out. In John 4, when Jesus had just spoken with the woman at the well, he turned to his disciples, addressing the issue of service towards others. His advice? "Open your eyes, the fields are ripe for the harvest" (John 4:35). The fields have always been ripe, but I have not always noticed. Maybe the best thing is just to "Open our eyes."

The evil giant genius and I have a lot in common, but with my eyes open to hurt, my heart open to empathy, and my life in tune with the spirit of God, I just might begin to notice, again. I was born with open eyes, but I have lived with them closed. As for now, they are readjusting to the light.

Dirty Stuff

I spent the last semester of my life in Europe. Yes, I am awesome. Thank you. In that continent, I went to many strange places, and one of those places is known as Amsterdam. Yep, I said it. The mere mention of that name makes the average person snicker and mumble something about marijuana. That is sad because Amsterdam is so much more than a hazy land of prostitution, but the "Red Light District" does exist.

Nights in Europe just seem more exciting to me. Being out late in independence while soaking in a foreign culture is thrilling. The air seems thick with some special quality of exuberance, and every second of my time there, I literally felt like I was in some fairy tale, as if I might sprout wings and fly at any second. Well, it was on one of these nights that I found myself in the heart of the Amsterdam Red Light District, flanked by three of my closest friends. Please do not think I am a terrible person. For a barefoot boy from West Tennessee, this was absolute culture shock. Prostitutes literally line the streets. They stand in windows, exhibiting their "wares," just waiting for someone to approach them for "business."

I walked along the cobblestone roads in this beautiful town with my eyes constantly glued to the few feet of sidewalk ahead of me to avoid a peep into one of the less than modest windows. Elaine, my fiance, commented that she thought that these ladies of the night had sad eyes. As I rounded one particular corner, I found myself gazing eye to eye with a woman in a window. I was startled to say the least, but as I later thought about those eyes, my first impression was not of sadness but of normalcy. I think Elaine saw sadness because that is what she wanted to see. She wanted these women to have hollow hearts and an overall lifeless existence, and I think deep down we all do. We are so comfortable, as a people, with the concept of an evil that is "out there." It is hard to believe that normal people, people with family and with all the typical hopes and dreams could get so far off the beaten path that one day they are in a window in Amsterdam, completely exposed. Maybe they could have been any one of us?

As I look at the redemption of man, one of the most prolific thoughts comes from the pen of Paul. As he said, "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us." How is it that someone can become sin? Think of the story of the crucifixion. Becoming sin, Jesus was exalted on a cross and murdered for sins that he never committed. He bore the shame and pain of my sin with openness in complete humiliation. Each of us has our own window that we hope no one ever sees, and while it is probably not one of prostitution, it is of equal shame. I completely deserve to be stuck in my window in absolute humiliation, but Jesus took that spot of complete openness. Stripped, Jesus stood physically and spiritually naked in my place. He became exposed for us, giving us a chance to beat the evil inside ourselves.

I know the story, and you know the story. Still, it is only when we see that our sin, our windows, made this story a reality that we can appreciate it. The problem is not that I sin. It is that I am a sinner. I am fallen, flawed, and worthless, but Jesus, the child of God, has become the sinner. I, the sinner, have become the child of God. That is grace. My shame, my pain, and my fate are all in his hands. He became sin, but more importantly, he became my sin. He stands in my window.

So, are her eyes sad? I don' t know. Maybe they are, or maybe they're just a little too normal for our comfort.

I feel so ashamed

I am beginning "to blog." The fact I just expressed the concept of writing on the internet in the infinitive form is sad. How trendy have I become? How many days will pass before I am found wearing jeans riddled with holes? How long do I have before I am consuming tabloid smut like crack? Am I set on a path to ultimate conformism?

I am not an especially talented writer. I am not a terribly funny or engaging personality, but I like to think. Many people spend many hours typing their reflections and ideals. I write not to compete with what is currently available, but I write so that I might better hammer my own thoughts out. I do not expect anyone to read this (making this particular post especially useless). I simply hope that by expressing my thoughts via this trendy venue, I might reach a higher competency in theological thinking. Much love.