When I was about 12 years old, my mom, my sister and I were making our way to an event and weren’t in the best part of town. We hadn’t eaten dinner yet, and there was a Sonic on the way. So, mom pulled our blue Datsun 3-speed into the bay and pushed the red button. The order was placed, and I waited with anticipation for the deliciousness of a Number 2 with mustard and a side of tater tots.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone ambling over to our car. My mom saw him too. Now, as a Father of 3, I realize her hesitation, but then I wondered at the emotion that felt like fear emanating from her as she watched him. She’d traveled the world by this point and had been in much more dangerous places and spaces, so I recognize her mother’s protective instinct.
Cognizant her children were watching, she barely rolled the window down.
“Yes? Do you need something.”
“Well, I haven’t really eaten anything today. Do you think you could order me something?”
She pushed the red button again.
When the Number 2 with mustard arrived, so did another white Sonic bag. This time, mom rolled the window down and handed it to him. And for a reason I didn’t understand, I sat in the backseat of that little blue Datsun 3-speed with tears of an emotion I couldn’t name rolling down my cheeks.
In the way things from childhood mark you for reasons you can’t altogether explain, that marked me. I was converted in that moment to the fact that needs exist in our broken world and we were put here to meet them.
I’ve been arguing in this space for the necessity of conversion in your life.
First to God.
Second to people.
But there is a third—what I experienced in that blue Datsun. There are needs in the world and we are put here to meet them.
What gets in the way of us doing this?
Of seeing the needs of the people around us as a part of our life’s purpose?
Our imagination.
Jesus told a story (see Luke 12) about a man who amassed wealth. His response to his wealth problem was to build bigger barns, not meet more needs.
Jesus told a story (see Luke 10) about two religious leaders who walked past a hurting, needy man, refusing to see him because it 'wasn’t their problem,' while a Samaritan, hated by that culture, stopped and cared for needs out of his own account.
Why did Jesus tell these kinds of stories? To convert our imagination.
In the parable of the barns the man could only see himself.
In the parable of the Good Samaritan, religious people could only see their purity and comfort.
Neither could see other people.
The conclusion? It’s hard to see the needs of others while we’re inside our own story.
As Americans, most of our story is shaped by the market. It’s captured the American imagination. Needs are met when payment is rendered. Business is a valid form of need meeting, but is only the beginning. The market is not the full story. This serves as an example. If the story we are in is fundamentally economic or social or political, our imagination will act accordingly.
The market tells us we are here to accumulate.
Society tells us we are here to advocate.
Politics tells us we are here to legislate.
Those say something, they just aren’t the entire story. Why allow our imagination to be captured by a small story?
The story Jesus comes to tell is God’s story of redemptive love. Love—Trinitarian, holy delight—is the story of God. And the love of God always moves outward to meet needs by starting where people are.
How do we know? God sends Jesus into the world.
Listen to the story of Jesus again from a different angle.
When we were in our need, living in the bad neighborhood of our humanity, we wondered across trash-strewn parking lots in search of sustenance. Not having eaten, we wondered over to a Sonic—hardly a haven—with lights and smells and warmth in hopes of someone’s kindness. The kindness of a stranger was all we had left.
We ambled up to an underpowered blue Datsun, three passengers inside. We did not know they had driven on purpose from the place of plenty into the neighborhood of need, its occupants—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—looking for us. Our approach brought an immediate rolled-down window. Love, not fear, rolled out the window. We were met with kindness.
“What do you need? We came for you.”
“I’m so hungry.”
Trinitarian delight reached through the window, and pushed the red button.
I don’t know how else to tell you friends.
Be converted to making your life about pushing the red button. - Pastor Scott Marshall, Wichita First Church of the Nazarene