Repent Re-imagine Reframe Reorient

I’m sitting in a coffee shop. There’s an older couple not too far from me talking and reading on kindles. There’s a gaggle of high school girls. There’s a young man sitting by himself. Is it me or does the guy sitting alone look sad?

My favorite barista has served me my drip coffee with room for cream.

I’m sitting working. Writing this.

And here’s the question:
What keeps me from striking up a conversation with any of them?

I have a relationship with the barista. We talk. I’ve seen that young man before. I think he’s in the military.

What is it that keeps me nailed to this chair? Fear? Judgment? Rejection? If I talked to them about my faith would they think I was a religious nut?

One of my goals as a member of the Outside Church Walls team is to repent. Repent simply means to change one’s mind or perspective. I think I can do that.

I am repenting from my own shy behavior that keeps my voice silent in public about who I know Jesus Christ to be.

I think this is how repentance begins, at least for me. I become miserable or so utterly frustrated with where I am that I begin to realize I’m stuck and way off course.

I am reimagining what a conversation might look like with not just friends but also acquaintances in the community.

I am reframing the Jesus Are You Saved conversation. Could the conversation look different? How would it look?

And by the way, now that I ‘m in repenting mode, I am starting to feel a bit put off by my past behavior. I mean, how could I just silently stand by letting others with narrow theology have the market share of air time?

For me, Salvation means wholeness and if I am clear about one thing, its this: my life is made complete by Jesus Christ, by being part of a body of people that gather weekly to celebrate and remember. I want to invite others to that. What’s more, I want to know what others are thinking about this faith I love so dearly. What are their concerns? What’s their experience in the wider community? What might be on the mind of this barista? That older couple? The others?

But how do I start this? And where to begin….

For too many of us, talking about faith outside of church has some heavy duty attachments to it. After all the only ones talking about their faith are often talking a belief that’s narrow: Salvation is not about being complete or whole, Salvation is about pie in the sky by and by, some heaven somewhere some day. And everyone else, well to hell with them.

My reorientation is sitting in this coffee shop, creating a relationship with this barista. Engaging her in conversation. That’s where I’ll start.

I’m going to start by showing up here. This coffee shop is just around the corner from St Benedict where I serve. There’s no reason I can’t walk over and be in relationship with those here. Now that I’m reorienting myself to the possibilities, I’m on the journey. I’m going to do this.

Sooner or later, I am going to have that conversation.

Dear reader, by the next time I write, I will have had that conversation and I will tell you all about it. In the meantime, won’t you join me on this journey?

What does it mean to you to repent of our silence? What do you re-imagine? How will you reframe and reorient?

Repent… here it comes. 

Rev. George