Everyday Benediction

He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her…

John 8:7 

What I remember most about my time in seminary were the long hours at the coffeehouse. The combination of caffeine and adrenaline fueled dozens of last minute papers and sermons. Yet, the one I remember most is the one when I didn’t get any work done at all, or at least that’s what I thought.  

I met a buddy to study at the coffeehouse down the street. We were studying boring church history stuff. Well, most of it was boring. I found out that the first colonial leader of my denominational was a man-whore. But more about that another time. 

Karl and I pushed two of those ridiculously small tables at the coffeehouse together and spread out our books to study. I started typing away notes on the Saxon migration to St. Louis. I didn’t get very far before,

            "Hello, do you mind if I sit here?" the woman in a red blouse and tight pants asked, as she was already sitting down. 

            “Sure,” I said, wishing I was less polite. I was there to get God’s work done for the week. I wasn’t there for idle coffeehouse chit-chat. Nothing good ever comes of it. It’s the conversational equivalent of Nazareth or Lubbock. Karl continued the chatter anyways.

            “What’s your name? Kelly? Nice to meet you, I’m Karl, and this is Will.”

            My eyes barely lifted from the keyboard as I gave a slight nod. Why is Karl painfully friendly, too? We’re not going to get much work done. I sighed.       

“What do you do? Where do you work?” Karl offered, innocently.

            “I work at Baby Dolls. I’m an exotic dancer,” she didn’t even flinch, “and I make good money at it. I feel free and beautiful when I’m on stage. My shift starts in a few hours.” She smiled and shrugged.

            “Ok.” I swallowed, trying to hold in my shock. Something inside me kept nagging me to ask her more questions. Dude, you ask everyone else you know lots of questions, ask just one more. I worried what would happen. I could tell Karl was a little gun-shy. Karl asked her profession and got more than he bargained for. It’s my turn.

            “That’s cool,” I said, willing my face to match my words, “do you travel much?” 

            “Yes, I just got back from visiting a Shaman in the jungle of Peru.”

            “You weren’t in Iquitos, were you?”

            “Yes, how did you know?”

            I smiled. Maybe this conversation won’t be a complete failure. “I have some friends there.”

            “Have you been to Peru?”

            “Yes, seven or eight times. We usually stay around the capital, Lima.”

            “But you must have been to Machu Picchu?”

            “Of course, it’s breathtaking. I still think the train ride there is the best part. The landscapes are just incredible. Mountain, valleys, small straw-hut villages, donkeys, farmers plowing yellow dirt,” my hands soared and winded like the train I saw in my imagination, nearly knocking over Karl’s coffee. He moved it behind his laptop, a safe harbor from the torrents of my Italian-style gesticulations.  

            Her smile widened. “I knew you there was a reason I sat here. Where else have you been?”

            “Nicaragua, Mexico–”

            “I love Nicaragua! It has even more beautiful jungles. I met a witch doctor there. She cured my hairline fracture,” she said, pointing to her arm. “Not only did she heal my body, she soothed my soul,” she clutched her heart and flipped back her long black hair, “I had just broken up with my child’s father and was afraid they might take my baby away from me. She gave me hope.”

            She finally finished emotionally vomiting all over our two tiny coffeehouse tables. I felt lost. It was one of the few times in my life that I had nothing to say.

            “Sounds like you are very spiritual. Who is God to you? Do you believe the God you follow is the God of the Bible?” Karl finally interrupts.

            “I believe God is everywhere and in everything. God is with me all the time. I pray to him all the time. He’s with me in the club. I pray over my clients as I dance for them.”

            I fake cough, gathering myself, not letting theological implications settle, “Really?”

            “One time, I was praying over a man I was dancing for and I felt led to give him a back rub. I could tell he was under a lot of stress. As I rubbed his back he relaxed, as if for the first time in his life. I sensed he was having troubles at home. I told him that he needed to go home. His family loved and missed him. He did. He never came back except to thank me.”

            “That’s interesting.”

            “But most aren’t like that. Most are like trying to fill up a flat tire. They never get filled. They always end up hallow and empty.”

            “So why do you do it if it’s empty? Isn’t it hard, depressing?”

            “It’s good money. I’m saving up to start a nonprofit. I want to help abused women. And I love the other dancers. They’re my sisters. I feel like their big sis.”

            “Well, Karl and I would like to invite you to join another community. A place where you can belong. Where you can join others searching for truth and love.”

            “I would like that. Is that what you do? Are you a community organizer?”

            “Yes, actually. We haven’t shared much about ourselves. I’m a pastor. I am who I am today because of a similar spiritual retreat to the jungle, in Nicaragua actually. There, I found an orphan with hearing problems. You see, I have had hearing problems all my life. More surgeries than I can count. I always blamed God for my struggles with hearing. But that day—when I met that orphan—it all made sense. God allowed me to suffer so that I would understand the suffering of others–”

            “I understand. That’s why I want to start the women’s shelter.”

            “Exactly. Anyways, I would like to hear more of your story and share more of mine. Can we invite you to come to our church on Sunday?”

            “Sure. Where is it?”

            “Here,” Karl rejoins the conversation now that we’ve returned to familiar ground and hands her his card. He writes his cell number on the back in case she gets lost.

            And so Kelly, Karl and I sipped on coffee and continued to have the most Spirit-filled coffeehouse chit-chat about Jesus and sinners and sellout tax collectors.  

That week marked a change in my ministry. In seminary, they taught me how to forgive sins on cozy couches in our offices, the more modern and roomy, and protestant version of confessional booths: no how-to courses on confession and absolution for exotic dancers. No one warned me that underneath my long hair and hippie clothes, a judgmental spirit remained. I was humbled by God that I was more like the legalistic Pharisees that constantly harassed Jesus, than the Jesus I claimed to follow. I pray that all of us let go of our need for people to be holy and churchy before Jesus and the Spirit ever fully enter their lives (that’s not the way it works anyways).

So, seminary certainly didn’t have a “Baby Doll Benediction” for such a time as this. But if they did it might go something like this:

“May the Lord bless you today as you expose yourself to soften the pain of others; may God’s face shine on you like stage lights; and may God’s love keep you close so that God may fill and plug your empty, flat tire of a soul with His peace, Amen.”