Ben Yosua-Davis
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Sometimes It’s Not About Me

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Sometimes it’s not about me.

A couple years ago, I went to a writing group at the library.

It was the end of a very long day.

I needed it, not in the way that you need those 50% off sales at Kohl’s for those clothes you wear once and then use for closet decoration.

I needed it.

I was exhausted.

I was sick at people looking at me as if I could give them something.

I was sick of people looking at me, period.

I needed just an hour where I could just be another writer working on another writing project.

I opened the door and winced. Sitting in one the library’s demi-indestructible chairs, with suspiciously perfect sight lines to the front door, was Marcia.

Marcia was one of those people who I try very hard to love, generally with little success.

Life had clearly beaten on Marcia a few too many times. She was so fat she just looked like a bunch of cylinders and spheres stacked on top of each other. She had a mouth with teeth that would make a dentist cry. She radiated stench like her own personal fog.

I had met her at a community event and made the mistake of giving her our number.

She had called, almost daily ever since, leaving long, rambling, only slightly coherent voicemails about her troubles.

She waved at me.

I said hi, trying to sound like I was pleased to see her.

I walked by by as quickly as I possibly could.

I was positive that there was no way, at the end of a day like this one, that Jesus would ever expect me to have a conversation with her.

She followed.

She talked at me about her problems.

I disengaged myself with as much trained politeness as I could muster and headed to the library’s front desk.

She followed me to the front desk and talked at me about her problems.

I gave her a good thirty seconds of listening and told her I had to go.

She followed me to the writing group and talked at me about her problems.

The other people in the group started to look up.

I was getting pissed: a little at Marcia, but mostly at God, for not getting rid of this woman who I clearly did not have the energy to deal with.

She continued talking.

Her significant other/boyfriend/fiance/enemy, depending on the day, was back in jail.

She was on the street and she couldn’t sleep, the cops kept finding her spots and waking her up at night.

She told me that her stomach hurt, because she hadn’t eaten for three days.

That’s when, in the middle of swimming through the aimless torrent of woe escaping from her mouth, I realized that God wanted her to eat more than God wanted me to have my hour of peace and quiet.

It’s a good thing I’m well trained.

I took her aside and asked her if I could get her a sandwich.

Yes, she said, a sandwich with ham, cheese, lettuce; and also oil, mayonnaise, and mustard.

This did not sound like a wise dietary choice to me, but it wasn’t my stomach, so I headed over to a nearby shop to get her a sandwich.

The guy at the counter looked at me oddly when I ordered. I explained, multiple times, that it wasn’t for me.

I gave Marcia her sandwich, which looked like a yellowish soup held between two piece of bread, asking her to please eat it outside.

I went back to my writing group, which was nearly over.

She returned a little later, told me that she found someone who would take her in for the night, and shared with me, a little reproachfully, that her stomach hurt.

I was not sympathetic.

This is generally the point in a story like this when I’m supposed to say that I suddenly felt a deep sense of peace and joy at being the hands and feet of Jesus to someone else, when I was glad that Marcia had walked into my life, disrupted my plans, and reminded me how important it is to serve others. This is the point where I should tell you that I smiled, was grateful for this opportunity, and went home refreshed.

That was not what happened.

I packed up my laptop and left, telling her that she could always call and leave me a message, which is pastor-speak for “I’m too nice to say it, but leave me the hell alone.”

I received no emotional satisfaction from the experience.

I was even more tired, more strung out, and more anxious leaving than I had been going in.

But in the end, it’s not all about me.

Sometimes hungry people have to get fed and I have to be the one to do it.

We get this idea sometimes that following Jesus is a road map to joy, happiness, and success.

In the long term, I think that’s probably true.

But often times, it means setting aside our own egos, our own needs, and doing something that just plain hurts, because it’s not about us.

It’s about serving the people that God loves.

I haven’t seen Marcia many times since then.

I can’t say I regret that.

But, wherever she is, I hope God’s finding people to buy her a sandwich, no matter how it inconvenient it might be.

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Prayer Is Like Washing Dishes

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I was talking about prayer with a few friends earlier this week.

“How do you pray?” someone asked the group.

I sat in the corner, sipping my drink strategically, trying not to say anything.

Naturally, someone said, “Ben, what do you think?”

“I’m not an expert.” I said.

“Well, you learned a lot about the Bible and Christianity. We want to hear what you think.”

I thought about telling them that I wouldn’t be their pastor in about ten days and I needed practice at sitting in the corner while  saying as little as possible.

Instead, I said, “I think prayer is like washing dishes.”

And, if it’s helpful for you, here’s my explanation, (with all the extra umm’s and superfluous words neatly excised.)

When people talk about prayer, it often sounds like something ripped from a movie on Lifetime: someone miraculously healed, someone’s longstanding addiction/anger/bad habit mysteriously taken away, someone saying, “Write a check to this stranger for $401.50 and lo and behold, that person had a child with a serious life illness and they needed exactly $401.50 to do their surgery! A miracle!”

Sometimes, prayer is Lifetime-movie amazing.

However, if you’re like me, prayer is often just like washing the dishes. I don’t get “anything” out of it, but I do it, because I don’t need a leaning tower of plates polluting my sink.

Prayer is about learning to communicate with God. As with all relationships, it takes practice, a lot of practice.  Sometimes that practice is satisfying, even fun, and sometimes it just feels like a waste of time.

I’ve had dry periods of my life, months, even years, where I “felt” absolutely nothing whenever I prayed.

I’ve had other periods of my life where I had incredibly moving experiences almost every time I talked to God.

Now, when I look back at the seasons of my life where God did the deepest work in me, almost all of them coincide with the dry periods, where praying was as inspiring as washing dishes.

When we pray, even if when we don’t feel like we’re “getting” anything out of it, it helps us know how to talk with God, even when we’re too busy, stressed, or overwhelmed to think straight.

The best spiritual writers all speak of prayer in exactly this way. Beware, they say, of seeking the moments of consolation, where you feel the presence of God vividly and powerfully. They are not what prayer is all about. Instead, seek the moments of dryness, when praying feels like nothing more than washing dishes. Rejoice, they say, for in those moments God is working so deeply in you that you can’t even sense it.

So – if praying feels to you like washing dishes, keep at it, God’s probably doing more in you that you would expect.

 

 

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In Quotes

Quote Thursdays

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God spoke to fourteenth-century mystic Catherine of Siena, saying, “I did not intend my creatures to make themselves servants and slaves to the world’s pleasures. They owe their first love to me. Everything else they should love and possess, as I told you, not as if they owned it, but as something lent them.” (Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals)

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Endings

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In less than two weeks, the Vine will be ending.

My wife wrote about her experience here. I’ve held off on saying much, wanting to be able to tie this story up in a neat bow (or, if neat bows are not coming, at least some twine and duct tape), before I said much publicly.

However, I’m beginning to realize that, when coming to the end of a journey such as this one, even twine and duct tape may be a long time in coming.

With that in mind, here are a few disconnected thoughts about where I’m at.

1) This was not just a job for me.

Doing this sort of work is not just a way to pay the bills. You hold up everything you cherish about what it means to follow Jesus, to be human, to be community, and then you try to make it reality in the people who you meet. I always wanted the Vine to be a direct, complete expression of my deepest held values and closely held dreams. For a little while, I was even paid to see if I could make those dreams become reality.

The fact that it didn’t take, (even though it bore much fruit,) after five years of good, but often unbelievably backbreaking, heartbreaking work, makes “moving on” a little more complicated than if I had been flipping burgers for the last half-decade.

My wife and I joked that the Vine was our first child. It was the center of our life for six years, sometimes at great relational, financial, and personal cost.  You don’t let things like that go easily, even when their time has come.

2) I’m Grieving.

And it’s a process.

Some days, I’m okay – even excited for what the future might bring.

Some days, I’m angry – at others for not living into the community the way I’d hope they would, or at myself, for all the mistakes and missed opportunities.

Some days, I’m depressed – and wondering if I’ll be condemned to a future spent stocking shelves at a grocery store. (Which is currently plan A. Anyone want some organic pineapples?)

Some days, I’m bargaining – (but not too often anymore), trying to figure out what could have been done differently.

Some days, you’re going to ask me how I’m doing, and I’m going to be way more honest than you really wanted me to be.

Some days, you’re really going to want to know how I’m doing, and all I’ll be able to do is give you a list of stock answers from my Bag of Appropriate Responses.

This is all okay. More than that, it’s healthy. It should be difficult to say goodbye to something like this.

So please, don’t worry too much about us. (Unless that worrying includes dropping pizza and/or chinese food and/or Ben & Jerry’s at our door. If that’s case, please, by all means, worry all you like.)

3) No, I don’t know what I’m going to do next

For the first time since I was ten years old, I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

At this juncture, I can’t visualize pastoring a traditional church.

At this juncture, I can’t imagine jumping back into the blast furnace known as church planting.

At this juncture, I have no idea what marketable skills an out-of-work ex-pastor could bring to the general public.

In short, I have no idea what I’m going to do next (although if you have any good ideas, please let me know.)

4) It’s all okay. Really.

I’m not panicking (at least not most of the time), because I believe very strongly that God is working through all of this.

No, I’m not just saying that either.

I may want the timeline to be a little faster, I may want to be able to see more than a few steps down the road, but in the end, I truly believe that God is working this whole thing together for good.

So – be gentle with us, be supportive, understand if we don’t respond to your wonderfully sympathetic messages right away (we still read them and definitely appreciate them), and if we don’t have all the answers yet. We trust it will all come together in time, even if God never gift wraps it for us.

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