O-M-G

I had a choice tonight. I could have stayed home, kicked off my shoes, grabbed a drink, and watched Lost and Glee on my 42” flat screen, or I could take a spontaneous but intentional trip to the the margins of our culture and look and listen. The later is always a risky venture at a couple of levels. Sometimes it is a choice between comfort and discomfort, between safety and insecurity, but it can also be a choice between the insignificant and the radical, between being lulled into complacency and being blow away.

I sensed that a trip was needed. I texted one of the few people I know who would consider such a spontaneous trip, my friend, Keith.  He was game and we took off. You never know what you will see; there are no guarantees.  I am sure Lost was good tonight, being the second to the last episode. But my man, Dallas Willard, taught me something about grace: “Until you step out to do it, no help is on the way. But once you step out to do it, the help is already there.” If you want to see the kingdom at work, if you want to see exceptional love and mercy confront heartbreak, suffering, and oppression played out in front of your eyes, if you want to drive a stake through your callous heart, if you want to be shaken to the core of your being, then, sometimes you have to get up off the couch and take a trip across town into the bowels of darkness and oppression.

O-M-G. It blew – me – away. Maybe I will post about it if I can find the words to do it justice. The point? Derek’s little league coach use to tell his players “Nothing good happens unless you swing the bat.” I am learning that the same may be true of the kingdom. Grace doesn’t happen unless you step out and take the field trip.