For the last week or so I have been battling with this story in my mind…
When I was 18 I went to a new church for a visit, I was in Clearwater Florida, and I hate shoes. So naturally I walked in with no shoes, khakis rolled up to my calf and a casual button up.
About half way through the service I was sitting with my legs crossed and my toes gently resting on the pew in front of me. Suddenly the man behind me leaned forward and angrily whispered in my ear, “Don’t you understand your disgusting feet are touching a church pew? Cant you have more respect than that?”
I immediately took my feet down, nodded, and continued paying attention to the service. However for the rest of the service I was battling whether or not I should talk to him after the service… I chickened out.
What would I have said???
I wish I would have had the courage to ask, “what if this was my first time here and you said that to me? What if I was an unbeliever and this was my first time giving church a chance?”
While I understand where he was coming from and in no way disagree I still wanted to put the thought in his head. And lately I have been regretting not having the courage to do so, to challenge people with new thoughts that might make the difference in someone’s life.
Here with the refugees I see tons of suffering, people sitting at the camp for days because the border is closed, people sowing their mouths shut in protest, people freezing in the night…
However, I also see the bad stuff. I see people refuse clothes because they are not “nice enough” I see people cut in line repeatedly for food, I see fights break out just because people are form different countries.
I see discrimination from volunteers because of peoples skin color.
I have met people who I would prefer to live next to my parents and little sister far more than I would prefer many Americans to live next to them.
And I have met people who I would not want to live next to them…
But the point is that the good people and the bad people are from every nationality, they represent all ages, and both sexes.
And I do not want to refuse people based on their skin, age, or sex. Sin is not related to any of that, WE ALL SUCK, WE ALL MESSED UP, WE ALL ARE SINFUL.
I don’t care if your skin is different, your old or young, male or female. I want to love you when you sit down in front of me with your shoeless feet touching my church pew and love you anyways.
I want to have enough courage to stand next to my countrymen encouraging them to have open arms and hold those running to us with the same comfort we received from God when we were retched.
I want to challenge your thoughts… If you cant accept a shoeless white 18 year old english speaking male in church, then you for sure cannot accept the thousands of wonderful refugees that are flooding through the camp each day.
Yes, it is scary… yes there are bad people all over the world…
But are you willing to reject the thousands because of fear, disgust, or distain, knowing that you also reject thousands of wonderful people???
Are you willing to look back on this 40 years from now and explain this situation to your children and have no regrets on the decision you made???
Are you willing to love that boy in front of you offending you with his bare feet?
