Southwestern Steak Sauce

Today,  Buc and I went south of 23rd St. SW between Jefferson and Washington Avenues.  This neighborhood gives a lot of mixed signals.  One house will be new with fancy siding, freshly poured concrete driveway and edged landscaping.  The next will have peeling paint, broken windows, sagging stairs and a roof that looks in serious need of repair.

As I walked today, I prayed for Christ's Peace, Joy and Healing on the people here, but the voice of my high school College English teacher kept intruding.  His favorite remark was "So What?"  He was always referencing a thesis statement, but I have found that question applies to many things in life.  As his question rolled through my prayer, "I pray Christ's Peace on you [so what?]," I tried to fill it in.  I pray so that . . .
God may be glorified?
misfortune will never befall you?
war will cease?

None of these seemed quite right, and it came to me that desire for change may not be the purpose of prayer walking.  Do I really imagine that everyone I pass is a Christian?  Do I believe that once I have walked and prayed here, no one in this neighborhood will lose a loved one, hurt a friend, go hungry, make only decisions with positive outcomes for the rest of their lives?  Those beliefs would be absurd, yet we are taught that all we have to do is ask, and God shall provide.

This touches an important thought for me.  I see sagging shingles or broken windows and assume that there is something going wrong in that house.  I see paper notices on doors and discarded playthings and I tend to think the people in those houses don't care; and then I start to imagine that Christ's power in this world is a magic power which will repaint the world to look pretty and prosperous.  But that isn't how it works.

I am reminded of a scene from one of the Toy Story movies where Woody ends up in a toy shop.  The shop owner repaints Woody, mends his clothes, and removes all traces of Woody's previous owner.  He then puts the doll in a box and readies him for sale to a collector of toys.  That isn't love.  That's fixing.  I believe God loves human beings.  I believe God calls us to love human beings.  Loving is not the same as fixing.

So what?  So, that house with gaps in the siding at the corner of Washington and 28th St. SW houses someone that God loves.  So, that house with the pretty Christmas lights is a house where God's beloved live.  So, that house with the rock cairns and Santa Claus is a place familiar to God. And God loves the people in these houses; as they are, with all the faded paint, tattered clothes, and missing pieces that come from life lived under this sun.

"I pray Christ's Peace on you because you are the beloved of God, [so that] my heart may be humbled and I may learn to love as Jesus loved."


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