Muck and Mayhem

I was sitting in my favorite meeting-Starbucks (as opposed to my favorite conversation-Starbucks, or my favorite work-on-my-own-Starbucks) about an hour before my meeting was scheduled to begin. Perched in a little alcove out-of-sight but not out-of-earshot I was unwittingly a witness to something unusual. Two men arrived about five minutes after me and sat at the nearest table to mine. They drank coffee silently for a while and when they first spoke I was startled, their voices to clearly present.

I wasn’t trying to listen, but they weren’t making any attempt to conceal what they were saying to each other. One man was clearly in a crisis. His health was compromised due to an addiction of some sort (probably drugs) and he was losing his marriage. The other man was asking advisory questions. “Do you think you can keep your program going?” “If Sarah will have you back, are in able to be in a relationship right now?” “You obviously can’t work, how are you going to pay your legal fees?”

They talked back and forth, struggling to come to terms with all that was wrong. The amazing thing was the man in trouble (and clearly he was a mess) was being as open and honest as you can imagine, while the other man was being very forthright. He wasn’t patronizing, he wasn’t trying to cover his fear, his anger, his discomfort. He also wasn’t acting harsh or trying to shame the other man.

After about 45 minutes of this exchange, they both lapsed into silence. I had been tuning in and out, trying to chip away at my pile of work, but distracted by their conversation and their compelling frankness. A few minutes later, I looked out the window and they were walking out, side by side, heading for their cars.

I took a pull at my grande drip, only to discover it was barely warm. Despite that unpleasantness, I felt a kind of vacant yearning…not for the troubles of the one man, but for the relationship he had with the other. That kind of bald honesty can only exist in the context of love. To love like that is an incredible commitment. To stand with someone else in the midst of their screwed up life, and not run away screaming is not easy. To not shame the other, or provide neat solutions, to just stand with him in the midst of the crisis is stretching yourself beyond the pale.

Of course, I couldn’t help but wonder if that sort of relationship is possible within the church. Obviously it is possible, but how likely is it? Sadly, churches don’t seem to be configured to foster that level of love and support. I think for many of them it’s more important that we appear to have it together, so people will think that Christ is cool, or that he changes our lives to the extent that our feet don’t touch the ground. Most churches aren’t a place where someone can be open about the fact that they are swimming in shit, and their snorkel is clogged. And more’s the pity.

I can’t imagine standing in the lobby of my local church and overhear the type of conversation that I heard at Starbucks. That must change. We have to be a hip-wader clad group of people, unafraid of navigating the muck and mayhem.