Fish and Chips=Epic Fail
Quantity does not equal quality. I made the fatal mistake of attempting to eat an authentic meal of fish and chips here in Killarney. There is no need to mention establishment names, but there is also not much to say other than the fact that the fish was bland (not even vinegar on the table); the chips (French fries) were hard on the inside; and the salt shaker was broken. Now the grand total of this purchase was 13.95 euros…that’s like 17 or 18 dollars. Epic fail. I was trying to treat myself because I had been doing really well not eating out and making sure I wasn’t wasting money, and then this terribly sad experience. Well, needless to say, I will not be making many more attempts to experience fine culture through the medium of food. I am content with my homecooking (make that very content). I would have been happier with a bowl of soup and a piece of brown bread.
Why am I explaining this grotesquely long boring story you ask because, of course, it is my desire to avoid talking about important stuff like calling and discernment. I’m getting there though.
Over this last month I have had more pastoral training than I have in my seminary experience. Throughout the last 2 years I have had enumerable opportunities to witness ministry (and for that I am grateful), but I will have to say I was never at a point before where I felt comfortable stepping in and being a part of that ministry in anyway that made me vulnerable. It is so easy in ministry to attempt to do the things that are important but are really detached. Building relationships and getting to know people, their stories, and ultimately their hearts is hard work, but it is by far the only work that really means anything (of this fact I am becoming more and more assured). That is why ministry is horrifying to me because if you are willing to really know someone then you must be willing to know someone—the good and the bad; the joy and the pain; the sin and the grace.
Over the counter hospitality is quite easy for myself. Giving someone a smile as they pass or exchange a few words is easy—I guess you could say it is cheap kindness because it costs me nothing and it has very little return. But costly kindness—the type that endures through intimacy is not easy. It takes a lot of grace to be able to embody this costly kindness and a lot of prayer. I also think it is a spiritual gift (that most ministers should probably possess). When you see people at their worst, at their most grieved, and at their most joyous—the intimacy of these moments that a pastor shares in are unique and, at times, overwhelming. Sharing tears with a stranger over the loss of his/her estranged, beloved son is not normal—but then the work of God is not normal. It comes in the form of a defenseless child to an unwed girl.
Sometimes cheap kindness is quite appealing because it is so easy, but it seems to me to be constantly fleeting. It has no endurance and, therefore, cannot sustain any type of meaningful relationship. The call of society pushes against any type of relationship that dares to defy cheap kindness because, if we do, we might just be guilty of sharing the unconditional love that God calls us to in 1 John 4. It is this fear of endurance, which prevents so many of us from doing things like training for marathon or hiking up a mountain or investing time into someone we might think might be flawed (news flash: that flawed someone is you.) Ah, but you see if we do love—the fear is vanquished.
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