Jesus Came to Your Door
Jess and I both shut down yesterday. She was overwhelmed because she had gotten the grass colors wrong on the animal mural she is working on, and the colors on the business cards she had ordered didn't turn out right, and the thank you card octopus image was off center. To top it all off, or more likely because of everything that preceded, she couldn't figure out what colors to get to correct the grass on the mural. She ended the night settling on a color for the business cards she didn't prefer (just to get it done) and looking at pictures of the mural, considering how the dark colors would show through whatever color she painted over them.
I was overwhelmed with the fact that my boss called me into the office and I kind of blew up. I told her that I know what I have to do, I have to be stronger and more pursuant (I might have used the word "shit"). She called me in because earlier I lingered on sending an email about a field trip that I had forgotten about, awaiting her approval (something I absolutely despise) and so teachers were left waiting for the list of students. Some students walked out of class to go to the field trip because it was the time they were supposed to go, but hadn't been called by the main office, and now I have to deal with that today. What burdened me in the evening was that East had a playoff game and I didn't want to go, but our group has the expectation that we go to every game. I bowed out, but I had to wait it out to see if anyone would call me on that.
Jess asked me to buy cigarettes. That's where we were. Overwhelmed. Defeated. She put Sadie to sleep. We went out on the porch drank our beverage of choice and dragged. I lit a second cigarette and asked her if she wanted some. She said yes, but immediately regretted taking a puff. I finished the cigarette and we went inside. She asked me if I would go to sleep with her, and we held each other in our dis-ease. She thanked me for being flexible to go to Home Depot for paint and get cigarettes. I didn't thank her for anything. I missed out on that opportunity.
At the Mapco, where I went to get cigarettes, I ran into our town's "unemployed bike guy". Whether he is actually unemployed I do not know. But I see him around, at CVS, at First Congo, and now at the Mapco. He's a guy who has his thoughts on life, he evaluates life on what he sees as good and not good. People that stop and say hello, give a few dollars are good. People that help him fix up his bike, good. His current situation of destitution, based on myriad factors I'm sure, not good. He's a kind of melancholy street guy with incomplete philosophies like the rest of us. When I saw him I walked up to him and said what's up. Another fast talking chattery guy, from California I learned, came out and gave him a few dollars. Looked like they had talked as he was heading into the store and he circled back to hook him up. He began talking about Jesus and saying that Jesus would have been going after guys like us, not the rich ministers like Creflo Dollar. I agreed. We parted ways and I went back to Jess, CA guy went back to his girlfriend, and bike guy found another gent to talk to by the tire pump.
Everyday is full of so much stuff. You never really know what will happen. We schedule our day to make it predictable and to accomplish things, and we do... we accomplish so much. We are a very accomplished people, in our own modern and isolated ways. But the most value I find is not in the planned out accomplishing kind of things, but in the random things that come up. Perhaps it's those things more than any other that God uses to show that He is still speaking and guiding. God is suppressed (or oppressed) by our busy lives where our calendars and strategies and planning reign. He shows up unannounced and then checks in on how we respond.
Keith Green has a song called Asleep in the Light that has a line, Jesus came to your door and you left him out on the street. What he's getting at are that our busy planned out lives leave no room for chance encounter. That simply is not in the cards, we didn't account for it, and so it will have to wait. But wait, Green grimaces in bewilderment, that's Jesus at the door?!
Lord, I'm stressed out. I want to get it perfectly. I want to be the best. I find myself ascending toward being an above-it-all. Can the word disaffected be used to describe me? How can that be? Lord, immerse me in the everyday. My boss's chief complaint about me is that I'm "way out there, too far ahead". That's been everyone's complaint. And I know that you've made me this way for a reason, but I let myself get carried away and I don't seek what's needed most in the moment. In fact, I find it hard to do in the moment what needs to be done. I avoid the pain and the pressure. Help me to understand my weakness and to move forward as a man who would open the door for Jesus, let Him in and give Him a place at the table, listen to what He has to say. In Jesus Name, Amen.
Asleep in the Light - Keith Green
I was overwhelmed with the fact that my boss called me into the office and I kind of blew up. I told her that I know what I have to do, I have to be stronger and more pursuant (I might have used the word "shit"). She called me in because earlier I lingered on sending an email about a field trip that I had forgotten about, awaiting her approval (something I absolutely despise) and so teachers were left waiting for the list of students. Some students walked out of class to go to the field trip because it was the time they were supposed to go, but hadn't been called by the main office, and now I have to deal with that today. What burdened me in the evening was that East had a playoff game and I didn't want to go, but our group has the expectation that we go to every game. I bowed out, but I had to wait it out to see if anyone would call me on that.
Jess asked me to buy cigarettes. That's where we were. Overwhelmed. Defeated. She put Sadie to sleep. We went out on the porch drank our beverage of choice and dragged. I lit a second cigarette and asked her if she wanted some. She said yes, but immediately regretted taking a puff. I finished the cigarette and we went inside. She asked me if I would go to sleep with her, and we held each other in our dis-ease. She thanked me for being flexible to go to Home Depot for paint and get cigarettes. I didn't thank her for anything. I missed out on that opportunity.
At the Mapco, where I went to get cigarettes, I ran into our town's "unemployed bike guy". Whether he is actually unemployed I do not know. But I see him around, at CVS, at First Congo, and now at the Mapco. He's a guy who has his thoughts on life, he evaluates life on what he sees as good and not good. People that stop and say hello, give a few dollars are good. People that help him fix up his bike, good. His current situation of destitution, based on myriad factors I'm sure, not good. He's a kind of melancholy street guy with incomplete philosophies like the rest of us. When I saw him I walked up to him and said what's up. Another fast talking chattery guy, from California I learned, came out and gave him a few dollars. Looked like they had talked as he was heading into the store and he circled back to hook him up. He began talking about Jesus and saying that Jesus would have been going after guys like us, not the rich ministers like Creflo Dollar. I agreed. We parted ways and I went back to Jess, CA guy went back to his girlfriend, and bike guy found another gent to talk to by the tire pump.
Everyday is full of so much stuff. You never really know what will happen. We schedule our day to make it predictable and to accomplish things, and we do... we accomplish so much. We are a very accomplished people, in our own modern and isolated ways. But the most value I find is not in the planned out accomplishing kind of things, but in the random things that come up. Perhaps it's those things more than any other that God uses to show that He is still speaking and guiding. God is suppressed (or oppressed) by our busy lives where our calendars and strategies and planning reign. He shows up unannounced and then checks in on how we respond.
Keith Green has a song called Asleep in the Light that has a line, Jesus came to your door and you left him out on the street. What he's getting at are that our busy planned out lives leave no room for chance encounter. That simply is not in the cards, we didn't account for it, and so it will have to wait. But wait, Green grimaces in bewilderment, that's Jesus at the door?!
Lord, I'm stressed out. I want to get it perfectly. I want to be the best. I find myself ascending toward being an above-it-all. Can the word disaffected be used to describe me? How can that be? Lord, immerse me in the everyday. My boss's chief complaint about me is that I'm "way out there, too far ahead". That's been everyone's complaint. And I know that you've made me this way for a reason, but I let myself get carried away and I don't seek what's needed most in the moment. In fact, I find it hard to do in the moment what needs to be done. I avoid the pain and the pressure. Help me to understand my weakness and to move forward as a man who would open the door for Jesus, let Him in and give Him a place at the table, listen to what He has to say. In Jesus Name, Amen.
Asleep in the Light - Keith Green
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