What Would Make You Walk In the Pouring Rain?

It's Monday evening in Valparaiso and dinner was cooking in the Wilson home. The weather was terrible - had been for a while, and the forecast was bad. A severe thunderstorm with heavy lightning and wind gusts up to 35 mph. Not a night for a walk, right? But it was Monday, and that's Allan's day, so neither rain nor...

About 5:15, I got in the Honda and prepared for the short trip to Allan's house. Our friend Allan eats with us almost every Monday night at 5:30. Sometimes he walks here, but most of the time, I drive to his house and pick him up. I hadn't driven three houses down and there was Allan with a yellow towel over his head and shoulders, coming down the street. It was FLOODING.

I got him in the car and back home. We had a typical dinner with him, full of laughs and punctuated by several "I so happy" statements from our guest. We heard about all his favorite topics - work with Mallory at Pizza Hut, his talks with Mark Knowles at the Valparaiso Fire Department, and what the latest Nascar and Atlanta Braves news was. About 30 minutes later, he said "David, I'm ready to go home" and I drove him there.

We gave Allan 30 minutes of our undivided attention and a meal.

And he walked through the pouring rain to get it.

Saturday I was delivering meals here in Valparaiso, and was struck by how much the people we delivered to wanted more than just a meal. They wanted contact. Community. To know they weren't forgotten. To know that someone cared. So we asked about their health, and we talked about the weather, and we listened.

Friend, YOU CAN DO THAT.

You do NOT need a seminary degree. You do not need to be ordained. You do not need anything but a heart that's willing to open to the needs of others around you. The Holy Spirit will provide everything you might possibly need, if you are willing to be available to be used as a conduit of God's love.

Are you willing?

Think about Allan, walking through that thunderstorm. There are many many more living near you who need a touch of God's grace. Will you let them know they are loved? That they matter? Maybe if we were to focus on finding the unloved and loving them like Jesus did we'd change the communities where we live. I'm not talking about another church program that meets on Monday nights. I'm talking about living to love.

Well?

Friday Night Thoughts

This quote got me thinking...


"I don’t know why life isn’t constructed to be seamless and safe, why we make such glaring mistakes, things fall so short of our expectations, and our hearts get broken and out kids do scary things and our parents get old and don’t always remember to put pants on before they go out for a stroll. I don’t know why it’s not more like it is in the movies, why things don’t come out neatly and lessons can’t be learned when you’re in the mood for learning them, why love and grace often come in such motley packaging."
— Anne Lamott (Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith)


Our friend Allan had a birthday this week. His 29th. 


And in a luminous pair of nights, his friends at New Hope made sure he'll never forget that he's loved. First, on his birthday Tuesday, Pam and JC Roberts made some of Allan's birthday wishes come true by taking him out to dinner at Ruby Tuesday's, and then they all went to the rack and rode the Karts. Allan had a blast as did everyone involved.

Then the next night as part of our Wednesday fellowship meal, we had a cake with 29 candles and some gifts.

Yep, I did place those candles too close together. :)

The world would see Allan as "motley packaging" in that he's developmentally disabled. And yet...not only does Allan frequently provide those moments of joy and laughter, but in loving him we learn more about what love really is. New Hope loves Allan deeply.


And that same world might look at New Hope and see a smaller church with less. But on days like today, when I'm looking back and seeing how large the hearts are of many of the people in this church... 


Sometimes God wraps His best gifts in "motley packaging."

With Arms Wide Open

Was just at our local Dollar General and heard one of the employees laughingly say to another "you'd better get ready, Allan's coming." The other replied, "I've already seen him twice today." Here's what was remarkable about that conversation - it was filled with smiles.

Allan's developmentally disabled, has a profound hearing loss, and cannot speak clearly. He's very persistent, and frequently very animated as he tries to interact with people. He has his routines that he likes to go through in conversation. Ours centers around our dogs, our oldest son Adam, having me tell Sean to "get out of my way", and Scooby-Doo. If you ever walk by my office and hear me doing my "Scooby-Doo, where are you - over here", I haven't gone crazy - Allan is with me.

While I was checking out today, I told the clerk who had been laughing about Allan's impending arrival that - yesterday, in 28mile an hour gusts of wind and rain coming down in buckets, Allan showed up on foot at New Hope to bring Bunny a "Get Well Soon" card.

Allan loves Bunny, and wanted her to know that. He never said one word about the weather, all he wanted to know was "Is Bunny feeling better?"

She smiled and said "That's Allan."

I told her that at New Hope, we think Allan's God's appointed messenger to teach us how to love better.

She smiled again and said "I think he does that for us too."

Friends, God is using everything He has to help us learn to love as He does. Our friend Allan is part of that.

Are we?