Open

I kept the front door open while I was doing some work at the church. I let in some fresh air and hoped people would stop by and visit. So he felt quite comfortable when he came in to just pull up a chair and chat.

Him, "Let me ask you a question."

Me, "Sure."

H - You and your wife (Pause) you're (Pause) married?

M - Yes

H - And you have a child together, right?

M - Yep.

(Pause)

H - and he was born (Pause) AFTER you were married?

M - That's right.

(Pause)

H - Well, who else do you have a child by?

M - No one else. Just her.

(Pause)

H - Well who else does she have a child by?

M - No one.

After another long pause and a perplexed look on his face, he continued this line of questioning.

This went on for about 45 minutes with more pauses for him to think and more perplexed facial expressions with each answer given.

In the middle of one line of questions he stood up, looked at me, shook his head, and without saying anything else wandered out into the night. The way I thought was too much for him to handle and he just had to leave.

Sometimes I have to put the Bible down and walk away into my own night, too. There are things in thee text that I've reviewed and studied and wrestled with. I've had long talks with God about them but mostly I just shake my head. After a while, though, I have to recognize that God's way of thinking is just so very different from mine and, from where I sit, it's just too much for me to handle.

It wasn't long after that evening's open door conversation that he and his mom moved across town and we lost track of each other.

So it was a real surprise when I parked my van in front of my house one Saturday afternoon about eight years later that I saw him riding his bike up my street.

"Remember me?" he asked as he pulled up beside me. I knew his face immediately and his name just a minute later. I asked what was going on in his life.

"I have a kid," he said. He grinned and held up his left hand as he said, "The mom and me, we're married." A gold band on his finger shown in the sunlight.

I don't know if those two conversations, eight years apart, had that much to do with each other. But the two together give me hope: not only hope for that kid and his family but hope for me, too.

Because it makes me wonder about my desire to better know the mind of God and the conversations and studies I've had to walk away from. I hope that they might be silently working in me and showing up in my life years later in ways I might not even remember or recognize.

And maybe when I run across those passages of scripture again they won't be quite as far out of my thought stream as when they first perplexed me. Maybe stepping away let them quietly work into the fibers of my being without me even really noticing.

Maybe not.

But there is hope.

Thank you, Lord, for not ever giving up on me.