Fears

Tonight I was sitting at a coffee shop reading a book. It is funny how words that someone wrote in another place and time and even another state of mind can mean so much to me. If you've ever had one of these moments you know that they stick with you for the rest of the evening and maybe even longer. There was a line in the book that said the best stories are always lived by those who are willing to go through the pain that they cost. I sat on that for a while. 

I'm actually still sitting on it. At this point I am still wondering if I have ever attempted to actually live, let alone live a great story. In the world I live in it is easy to find myself inside of a box of the right things to do and steering clear of all of the wrong things to do. And sometimes the right thing to do gets labeled as the wrong thing or maybe even worse, the unwise thing to do. For a self conscious person, it's a nightmare. There is something inside of me that tells me if I never risk I will never live. And to risk, I need to overcome my fears. Which leads me to the question I have hated all my life. What am I so afraid of? Because when I am honest with myself it seems to come down to such silly things. I am afraid of what people will think of me. I am afraid that I will fail and people will laugh at me or say, "I told you so." I am terrified that if I jump off the cliff there will be nothing to catch me. I am afraid of letting my family down. I am afraid of letting my father down. 

These seem to be the fears that swallow my dreams. But I have a feeling that is about to change. Or at least I'm praying that it will.

Fail

I fail. In fact, I fail a lot. I have been a failure in relationships. I have been a failure in school. I have been a failure in ministry. I have been a failure in self control. You name it and I've probably failed in it. But I haven't failed life. I think what I like most about life is that it always moves forward. There is always a new day. Maybe God made it that way to remind us that He is very much the same. We can fail time and time again but He is always inviting us to move forward, to learn from it and to grow from it. I guess I have begun to have a strange appreciation for failure. It reminds me that I am alive. It disrupts my flow of life and steps all over my pride. But in the off chance that I succeed in something that I have failed previously, well quite honestly it makes it all the more meaningful. To be honest, if I was always successful I think I would probably forget what true success is. Surely it has to be more internal than external in the end. It must come down to the change and growth of the heart. And to be successful in this way, we have to fail.

Love?

Love is a strange thing. We probably get most of our ideas of what love is through movies or Tv shows here in America. I know I did, which, needless to say, was an incorrect view in most cases. I had usually thought of it as this great overwhelming feeling inside that made me nervous and had the strange effect of robbing me of my vocabulary. Or perhaps it was connected to some romantic scene from the last movie I saw in which the man runs down the woman that he almost let get away, but finally comes up with the greatest line ever used in the perfect moment to use it, which of course leaves them at happily ever after. Now, I'm sure that at some level, these moments can truly speak of love. But the more I live, the more I realize that love of the highest level doesn't really look like these moments. In fact, in my experience, it doesn't look like them at all. 

I was walking home from work one evening when an older woman whom I knew passed me. I said hello to her and we got into a conversation. Let me introduce you to Alice. She is around 50 and from the Middle east, is missing some teeth, has a terrible skin disease and by all rights and purposes would not be the first image that pops into most peoples minds when they think about love. I asked her what she was doing and she told me that she was on her way to Jack in the Box for dinner. I asked her how her brother was doing. She told me that he was the same, but when she gives him food from Jack in the box, which the doctors may or may not necessarily know about, his smile is from ear to ear and he does his best to respond with what little ability he has at the moment. Let me introduce you to Alice's brother. He is around 55 and from the middle east, is paralyzed and mute. His communication generally rests in his eyes, his smile and the small murmurs that he can manage on a good day. He lives in the assisted living facility just down the street. 

I can still remember the first time I met both of them. I was at the assisted living facility playing bingo and music for the people there when a nurse asked me if a couple of people and I would like to go upstairs and say hello to Alice's brother. I had no idea what that meant but I surely wasn't going to say no. When we walked into the room Alice and a nurse were standing on either side of her brother, asking him to eat. Though he didn't respond vocally, we could tell he didn't seem to want the Jello. It really was a mess. It was one of those moments when humanity was at its rawest. There was nothing sexy about this. There was spit on his shirt and the nurse's and Alice's shirt. Bits of red Jello everywhere. I am pretty sure the bed pan had just been used and the murmurs he was making sounded terrifying. I was exhausted and I hadn't even set foot in the door. Little did I know that this would become one of the greatest pictures of love I have ever seen. 

Alice visits her brother every day. Every. Day. Every day she walks from her home to the assisted living hospital. Every day she takes in the smell that only a hospital can exude. Every day she walks to the elevator after signing in and rides it up to the third floor. Every day she walks down the hall before making it to the last room on the right. Every day she walks in and her brother is there, lying mute and motionless in a bed. And every day she sits down to talk to him and take care of him. Every day. Surely the day I witnessed was not a great day, but probably wasn't the worst day either.

 Love does not rest in the high and lofty notions that we usually put it in, but it shines in the dirtiest trenches of life. It braves the mess of humanity and hides among the mundane. It is not scared of scars or smells or uninviting rooms. It finds it's way past the normal human will or want. It pushes past a desire of self and makes its home in the discipline of service. It lowers itself and accepts humiliation. Most of all, it does not care what others think because it knows what is right. And because its name is Love, it carries this knowledge out in action. Alice knows Love and this Love shines through every imperfection that she carries with her. The world may never know her and she will probably never seek to be known. Her everyday life may never leave the 3 mile radius she frequents right now and she will probably fade into the background of a busy city with busy people. Perhaps in the end we will all sit around a table in heaven and Alice will be sitting at the place of honor. We would all wonder what she did to be given that seat. Maybe someone would ask, "Lord, who is the woman at the head of the table." To which He might respond, "She is a woman that the world missed. She is a woman that the world never saw. But I assure I saw her. And I loved every minute of it."