The Stranger in the Waiting Room

As a pastor, I get so involved with meeting the needs of the people in my church.  One Monday afternoon, that became apparent.  I had to travel almost 100 miles to St. Louis to be with a church member as he was having surgery.  As we gathered in the waiting room, we got to know each other better and then our conversations of acquaintance became a time of sharing stories.  There were 5 of us in that waiting room on that hot and muggy afternoon.  The large waiting room seemed empty during that late afternoon except for the five of us and an older African-American gentleman.  He sat just a short distance from us with his arms folded and his heads bowed.  Nodding along with our conversations and lifting his eyes to laugh along with us.  I got up to stretch and peered out of the large sheets of pane glass windows that lined the western side of the room.  I continued to listen to the conversations of those that I had met for the first time.  There was only one that I knew and that was the church member's wife.  I turned to look at the gentleman who had yet to budge from his seat and was in the same arms crossed position that he had now been in for 30 minutes.  As I returned to sit, I moved to a chair closer to him.  I introduced myself to him.

The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. (I John 4:8)

The Christian life is about showing the very character of God.  Most people will never pick up the Bible and learn who God is unless first seeing it in the life of God's redeemed.  In Matthew 22, a Jewish lawyer posed Jesus a question.  He asked, "What is the greatest commandment?"  Jesus responded to the question with this answer:

" 'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.'  This is the great and foremost commandment.  The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)

Everything we do comes down to one word.  Love.  If you look at the words of Jesus you will find that it is love for God and love for others, but never love for self.  This is our motivation.  The Apostle John quoted Jesus saying "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13).  Love is not something you say, love is something you show.  Love need not be explained, it is simply evidenced.

After 30 minutes, he became an integral part of our conversations.  We listened to his stories as he listened to ours.  I am sure he welcomed the company.  He no longer felt alone as he had been waiting on his wife for almost three hours.  A stranger became a friend.  Finally the church member that I had come to visit had finished his surgery and the doctor came in to tell us that all was well.  With grateful news, we circled in to pray.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw him.  His arm had returned to a crossed position and his head and head bowed slightly.  I walked over to him and asked him, "Would you like for me to pray with you and for your wife?"  He looked into my eyes as a tear streamed down his face.  With a quiver in his voice he asked "Would you?"  I reached for his hands and we joined a circle.  I prayed a prayer of thanks for the success of our church member's surgery,  I squeezed Joe's hand and prayed for his wife Belle.  I asked God's comforting presence to be felt in this hour of need.  As I closed the prayer, I shook Joe's hand and said, "It was great to meet you.  He responded "May the Lord bless you".  With a chuckle and a smile, I responded back "He did bless me when he crossed our paths".

The one who says, "I have come to know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: (I John 2:4,5)

What commandments must we keep?  The two great commandments.  Love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind and then also to love your neighbor as yourself.  Everything we do should be borne out of that love.  Even our love for our neighbor is borne out of our love for God.  Christianity is not about saying that one is a Christian, it is showing that one is a Christian.  Opportunities to show will always present themselves, it is what we do with them that defines where our priorities in life really lie.  There are many around us who are desperate to know the love of Christ and for them it is up to us to show them what the love of Christ is like.

I may never see Joe again, but I hope that by the end of the night, he learned what the love of Christ is like.  Are others around you knowing what the love of Christ is like?  Are they seeing it?