But Hey, What’s a Guy to Do?

I woke this morning when my crazy pooch, Jimmy Page, thought 4:30 AM was plenty late to sleep. My head came off of my comfortable pillow, I rolled off of my comfortable mattress and headed downstairs to get water and start the coffee. Of course, Jimmy needed his routine initiated first: let outside, food, and freshwater. I bundle this little scenario and offer it as a symbol with the tag, “I have no reason to complain.” The first five minutes of my waking is representative of a very long list I could make, of securities, comforts, and luxuries I am spoiled with every day. Of course, no one escapes vulnerability, because life turns on a dime, right? Still, I do not live marginally, so my vulnerabilities are easier to keep quieter in my psyche, compared to many.

I have a friend in the city. Well, I don’t know if a friend is a right word. It is someone I care about, and someone I have helped meagerly but consistently since the turn of the millennium with financial needs. He has never asked me for much. His name is Adel, his baptismal name is Peter, so he goes by Adel Peter. He is a Christian from Sudan, who fled with his family from the religious persecution there. He was an English Teacher. Sometime in the mid-1990s, he was in a truck with many others near the Libyan and Egyptian border.  A terrible accident left Adel as the only survivor. He lay helpless with injuries for several days. The unlikely thing happened. He was found before perishing and scooped up and away for medical attention. YMCA International learned of his case, and when his condition allowed for travel, he was brought to the massive complex of Medical expertise here in Houston. His head injuries left him differently-abled, radically so. He learned again how to walk, and to speak. His physical and occupational therapy in the time allowed him to work part-time in light manual labor. With augmenting financial relief, he has lived on his own ever since.

It has been scarier delivering aid to Adel Peter during the Pandemic. I double-mask, I walk briskly between the wings of the crowded apartment complex in the Gulfton barrio. Many of the apartment doors are open with youngsters scampering about everywhere, with their watchful caregivers nearby. Reaching Adel’s locked door, I knock, he opens. We bow, socially separated, and exchange warm but bare greetings of Christian friendship. I hand him the small offering. I walk quickly back to my car and drive back to my familiar and reassuring settings.

Pre-COVID I liked it better. My visits were brief, but I could go in. I could sit in his tidy front room. His sense of hospitality compelled him to bring me a budget brand soda, as a symbol of care and welcome. The den and kitchen looked clean, but I was bothered to spot the presence of cockroaches. Once while he went to the kitchen, I took a picture of a painting he has on the wall. I would show you but I can’t locate it; so, I will describe it to you. It was painted colorfully and simply. In the scene, a man is clinging to a branch, broken and bent down: the branch of a tree on the bank of a river. He dangles just out of reach of the open jaws of a crocodile. On the part of the branch still intact and attached to the tree is a menacing snake. On the bank at the foot of the tree is a lion. The man clings. It is a picture of desperate fear. It is a picture of the last ember of hope. As I stare at the terrible art, I feel the bark of the tree branch gripped tightly by cramping hands. I hear the question, “What else can I do?”

Many human beings, many of you, have been gripped with fear, having faced life-threatening circumstances. Some people abide in mortal danger and exposed vulnerability. We pray that God makes us deeply aware of the shortness and uncertainty of life. Still some of the comforts that surround me make me less aware, less vigilant, living in denial.

I thought of that unsettling art piece if I can call it that when I read the passage from Amos that we will absorb Sunday at worship. Look how the prophet prompts change and new ways with the words the Lord gives him for the people:

Thus says the Lord, the God of hosts…

Alas for you who desire the day of the Lord!

why do you want the day of the Lord?

It is darkness, not light;

as if someone fled from a lion, and was met by a bear;

or went into the house and rested a hand against the wall,

and was bitten by a snake.

Is not the day of the Lord darkness, not light,

and gloom with no brightness in it.    — Amos 5:18-20

 I wish Amos had pulled punches with his delivery of the word, but he just didn’t. He wants his hearers to see the ominous uncertainty that comes with dawning accountability and a day of reckoning. Are you one of the prophet’s hearers, and are you responsive? Or are you able as I am to feel your current comfort, and carelessly ask, how tough could it be? I have had a few scrapes, but I made it through. Won’t the eschaton just be an extension of this rolling season of security? Perhaps so (I say with my fingers crossed).  Perhaps I can do an extensive self-examination, and God and I would then agree that there is no call to adjust or change anything. Maybe instead of the bumper sticker, “Be Patient with me. God isn’t finished with me yet” I should get one that says. “Deal with it. God’s work in me is done, and this is the final product.”

 The Sunday lectionary, the schedule of our reading, is a problem. It has me reading things I am not comfortable with, and I want to ignore it. It has me trying to absorb the Christian tradition of anticipating a final consummation of the reign of heaven. I feel uncomfortably urged to let that future into my present experience, and challenge me to change. Amos’s warnings had to do with people not loyal to God and God’s ways. They had made deities of things more secure for them, and more convenient for them. I hope that is not me, but I feel strongly encouraged to take a look. Here is the hope, and the good news. With a view of the end in mind, we can adjust and prepare in the present. Using the imagery from Jesus’ parable, we can trim our lamps and bring extra oil. In that case, the Bridegroom’s coming looks exciting and wonderful: while the unprepared bridesmaids went to buy oil to replenish their lamps, “the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding banquet.

 I have always considered Adel Peter my superior, spiritually. I have always benefitted from knowing and responding to him. He lives on the edge; I live with many buffers. I hope I can reach him this weekend, and he is still okay. He never intends to do this, but with any contact I am reliably encouraged to do better, and to be open to Christ’s process, changing me and making me ready.