I work in coffee shops a good bit. I generally start my day working in one then spend the rest of the day working with Jason (Rez staff member) in the Risen City Center. I’ve seen a lot of people. I’ve listened to some. I’ve shared the gospel with some. I’ve laughed with some. I’ve just nodded at most.
Today I was working on a future sermon series when I noticed a conflict at the counter beginning to escalate. A lady had come to the shop with a handful of of tracts and was going around evangelizing different customers. Which would be great at the mall or on the street, but seems a little out of place in a small business. Nonetheless, the staff knew she was there and were fine with it as long as the customers were. Some customers were getting visibly uncomfortable though, shiftily looking to the counter for a reprieve from the lady’s ideological onslaught. The staff calmly let her know that the conversations were becoming inappropriate for the store, and that these customers were here to work and enjoy a hot drink together.
Listen, I wish I were bolder when sharing my faith sometimes! Up to this point, I would have admired her hustle, even if our methods of evangelism may differ. I probably would have shaken her hand on the way out and offered some words of encouragement. When confronted by the staff, she could have bought a drink herself and sat down with people to hear their stories and hopefully share hers. After all, so many Christians have done just that in this very shop.
But she didn’t do that.
She began referring to her rights (which yeah, I get, but you’re in a private shop). She quickly got really angry. Soon the whole shop was watching and listening to the scene unfolding before us. In a strange moment of irony, she finally had the very attention she wanted. And this is how she used it. She pointed at a barista and angrily yelled, “You hate God, and I hate you.”
You hate God, and I hate you.
Wow. Those words stung me a bit. A professing believer looked into the eyes of a non-believer, and with a finger to his face, told him she hated him. I put myself in the barista’s shoes and tried to imagine this being my only experience with people of faith. It was just absolutely incomprehensible. Until it wasn’t. I began to realize that, though I’ve never popped off like this lady, I too struggle with rejection. When things don’t go my way, I too can end up in some ugly places. I too can not show love to people who I think just don’t understand me. I started to point my finger at this lady as the root of so many problems Christians have in the public square, but right before I did, I realized the depth of my own sin. I became acutely aware of the log in my own eye.
That God, in Christ, can look at me in my sin and love me is a miracle experienced daily. This is the good news of the gospel, and that good news is available to me, to the lady who freaked out, and the baristas who took the brunt of her fury. I was angered by what she said. But in this lady, I saw a bit of myself.
I’ve hated God, but he has loved me
I don’t know if she’s a Christian. I don’t even know if her tracts were Christian tracts. I do know I saw the fruit of a culture war in that interaction. I saw in that lady something I never wanted to become. Then after some reflection, I began to see in myself so many things I did not want to become. The only way to avoid the vitriol and bitterness so prevalent in this cultural moment and to stay focused on what God is doing inside of us is to stay rooted in the soil of God’s transforming grace.
