From the mind of Paul Jones

I don’t know if you are anything like me, if you are, you always encounter problems at the very end of a project. In my life, it seems to happen most when I am doing something technical, difficult or very labor intensive. I have it happen when changing brakes on a car, when writing computer code and most recently, when digging holes. I hope you are not like me, in that my past experiences put major roadblocks in front of me when I have something to do. It may be because I am hyper-analytical or that I have an un-useful idea of personal perfection that makes even the smallest projects too large to tackle or so complicated that I can’t summon the necessary motivation to get started. It is probably rooted deep in some childhood experiences I have yet to excavate, but it is something I actively war with.

Recently, I have been considering the idea of community and what that means as a Christian. When I chose to move into a less desirable area of Nashville to live, there was some sort of driving desire to connect with and serve my community, something I had no idea how to do. I have been digging into the Bible and trying to figure out what it is that is gnawing at me from the inside, something that isn’t satiated by a church community or a group of friends, something that is rooted more in a desire for others to know the Father’s love for them.

Several years ago, I had an soul-itch, an inner irritation that seemed to be drawing me to the foreign mission field. In the fantasies of my mind, I had conjured what that would look like, reaching out to people and introducing them to Christ. I had warm fuzzy thoughts of having some deep spiritual flow that would supply all of this need that the world had for Christ, something supernatural, powerful…. and completely unrealistic. It was when I was reading a biography of one of my spiritual heroes, James Hudson Taylor, that I encountered something that would shake my concepts and wake me from my foggy dream.

Taylor felt the calling to the mission field in China at a very young age, something that remained in him and motivated him into his early adult years. He too was caught up in the foggy dreams of the mission field. In his dreamy state, he imagined that by simply going to China he would suddenly be imbued with the life of faith necessary to live under harsh conditions with few lines of support and be fortified in a way to make the gospel effective. During one of his many moments of prayer he received a sudden conviction. How could he possibly expect to live by faith in China when he had no experience of living by it at home in England? This thought changed the direction of Taylor’s life and provided a solid foundation for the life of faith that was to mark him as one of the most influential missionaries of all time.

The changes that such a consideration had on him were powerful, several of them left my cheeks tear-stained as I read the accounts. Taylor learned something that helped me greatly; there is no grand tomorrow in which everything will be different, everything is as it is today and you must live now. I had some sort of fatalistic desire to be a missionary to the Muslim world, something that I knew could likely lead to martyrdom. I knew that ministry in such a place would require more than a sound doctrine, it required a gospel living, something I was pretty sure I didn’t have.

When I got over some of my dreamy ideas of missionary work, I began to ask myself if I was living any sort of gospel life. Sure, I was faithfully meeting with my local church, serving the Body in several different areas of service, I was offering my tithe, I was seeking the Lord in His word and yet I had some deep yearning to have a life that meant more to the people that surrounded me. I wanted to care for people in a way that I desired to be cared for and loved. I quickly realized that I didn’t need a foreign mission field, all the challenges that would press me into a genuine gospel living were right in front of me, in the homes of my neighbors and in the streets surrounding my neighborhood.

When I moved into my house in Nashville, the Lord presented my with some neighbors that are pressing me into such a gospel living. It didn’t take me long to discover needs right next door. Over the last two years I have been inwardly compelled to care for my neighbor Mrs. Dillon, a little 80 year old widow with many health problems and nearly as many family ones, with a broken body and a vivacious spirit.When I introduced my girlfriend to Mrs. Dillon, the need to become involved in Mrs. Dillon’s life multiplied. Kim, being a woman, was instantly endeared to Mrs. Dillon. Such a relationship allowed us to look more deeply at her needs and discover just how much she needs a helping hand.

I don’t intend to take you on a journey of my experiences with Mrs. Dillon, instead I wanted to take you into the place where love is tested. The gospel life is not easy, I think that is because it requires an exchanged life, much like the apostle Paul expressed when he declared, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives within me.” One of the first lessons that God began to teach me in this little experiment in community, is that there is no room for my self. I know that God has a sense of humor when He teaches me things, or at least I am sure He did when my lawnmower broke.

One of the ways that I became involved in Mrs. Dillon’s life, began with mowing her lawn. Before I moved in, my neighbor across the street, Napoleon, a man in his 60’s used to mow her lawn. I noticed him out there one day mowing and suddenly felt convicted that such an old man was mowing her lawn when I was perfectly capable; so, when the next week came around and I pulled out my lawn mower to mow my own lawn, I went ahead and mowed her’s as well to save Napoleon the trouble. Beginning with the first time I mowed her lawn, God began to teach me.

God’s teaching began when, with sweat pouring down under the Tennessee sun, I began to consider how I could shortcut the mowing and move the process along faster. Mowing my own lawn was taxing enough in the heat and an additional lawn was pushing my out-of-shape body physically. Almost immediately, when the thought to shortcut the lawn came to me, the phrase, “love your neighbor as yourself” seemed to ring out. I began to consider what something like that would mean in terms of lawn-mowing. I was astounded how quickly my analytical and legalistic brain began to argue for the gray-area and try to determine the absolute lower limit of what is required to love someone as myself.

How quickly I am mired in reasoning, but it was clear to me that if I had not shortcut my yard, I should not shortcut hers, so the scraggly areas behind the shrubs got mowed and I moved the trashcans away from the fence to mow the area where they sat, I think I even brought out the weed whacker and trimmed. I felt satisfied that I had fulfilled the law, and when my neighbor Napoleon commented on how good it looked, I felt pretty good about myself… but God had more for me to learn.

Some time, shortly after becoming Mrs. Dillon’s new lawn care service,  I was out doing my religious service of “loving my neighbor” when I ran afoul. While attempting to get a cut close up next to the house, I ran my mower over a grounding stake that sat was left over from some TV antenna that probably graced their roof back in the 70’s. Such a small thing contained my next lesson, and I’m sure God was chuckling over this one. CLUNK! It was some version of that sound that my mower made before the machine jarred violently and the engine died.

I don’t remember what I said, but I am pretty sure that some profanity was involved. I was not finished with the lawn and now my mower was broken, but the biggest problem was with my reasoning. Immediately I began to murmur. Why did this have to happen when I was “loving my neighbor?” If I had just simply stuck to mowing my lawn, I would still have a working lawn mower. What a way for me to be repaid for my love! Jammed packed in a twisted grounding stake and a severely bent lawnmower blade was revelation– what I was offering wasn’t love.

Ultimately, I bought a new mower blade (I probably needed a new one anyway) and I finished the lawn, but the revelation that I had that day would stick with me and I would continue to muse on. Eventually I would come to realize that much of what I was doing for Mrs. Dillon was motivated by some twisted sence of obligation and was not sourced in any sort of divine love or exchanged love. The challenge to develop community in love, is something that God is continuing to teach me, often at times when someone’s need bumps up against my personal issues.

I have plenty of personal issues and there are plenty of needs out there, so God has plenty of opportunities to perfect this kind of love in me. Most recently it involved holes. Mrs. Dillon’s house is in poor repair and Kim and I had identified several key things that we could do to improve Mrs. Dillon’s standard of living and make her environment safer for her. One of the most obvious, was her front step. Every day Mrs. Dillon would make her slow trek to the mail box, often to discover is empty. There are many hazards along that path for an 80 year old woman with such a broken and feeble body, but the greatest was her front step.

Much of Mrs. Dillon’s house was constructed in a shoddy way, but her front step was simply dangerous. A standard step has a 4-7″ rise and a 10″ deep base. Mrs. Dillon’s step had a 10-11″ rise and a 16″ base. There was only one step– and it was a doozy! I know that there is no way to help you understand how jacked-up this step was because just telling you inches most likely doesn’t help you at all, but I guarantee you that you are so used to what is standard, that if you encountered a step that was just an inch or so out of standard you would realize it immediately because your foot is trained to expect a solid surface after only so much drop.

To watch Mrs. Dillon navigate this step would probably be funny if it wasn’t so pitiful. Her stooped and broken body would move slowly out the door and head directly for the wrought iron  supports at the corner of her stoop, she would grip the iron and turn herself completely around and go down the stairs backwards. With such a large drop and no hand railing available, this was probably the single most dangerous thing that she encountered on a daily basis and something that had to be remedied.

I considered the options for fixing her concrete step and erecting some hand rails and Kim and I set out for Home Depot to price some materials. It turned out that iron handrails are really expensive and we had to come up with a new solution that fell within the available budget that was set aside to help care for Mrs. Dillon. Kim mentioned that her grandfather made some railing with iron pipe and I realized that pipe railing was quite common, as a matter fact, that was what I had for railing on my front steps.

I’ll save you the details and all the adventures had in getting all of the materials, but I will say, it wasn’t easy or straight forward. But Kim was diligent to remind me how much this was needed by my lovely old neighbor. I decided to augment the existing concrete step and pour a new step on top of the existing one. This was easily done, it took about a half and hour to build a form and another hour and a half to mix the concrete, pour it and finish it.

Once the new step was set and usable, it was clear how badly it was needed. I almost felt ashamed for waiting so long to get around to putting it in, but the pipe railing was another beast entirety. I have to actively resist telling you about all of the issues we had with the piping, things made me want to abandon that part of the project several times. The pipe was cut to specifications and threaded so that they could be connected together with angled fittings and all that pipe sat in front of my house for weeks waiting for me to get up the energy to do it. Every time I came home, I was haunted by the sections of black iron pipe that sat tilted precariously against the white vinyl paneling adorns the facade of my front porch.

I had even begun to screw together the parts to make the railing– a project I abandoned on day, leaving a partially built railing setting in Mrs. Dillons yard. Over and over, I told myself I was waiting for the energy, ultimately, I realized I was waiting for the love. I was sure that the railing portion of the project had gotten filed into the “obligation” drawer, something I could shirk and put off as long as I wanted to, something entirely devoid of love.

Eventually, my heart was rekindled and I set about to build a most excellent set of railings for my neighbor. I think part of the reason it was difficult to love my neighbor in this way, was because I knew the work involved was hard. Digging post holes for the pipes by hand is sweat work, made more difficult by the occasional rock or large root that seems to show up just to impede progress. Had already filled my mind with all of the possible difficulties I would encounter along the way–only to discover others I didn’t think about.

It turns out that my first set of post holes weren’t as difficult as I worried they would be. The dirt was hard due to the lack of rain, but for the most part no other obstacles appeared. But I am a cynic by nature and my mind began to think about the greater problems that would befall me with the next set of holes, but my worries were unfounded, the second set was even easier that the first. Before I knew it, I had the rails constructed and set in the holes. I poured in the Quikrete and voila, handrails, for the first time, Mrs. Dillon could go down her steps safely–looking forward.

But my story doesn’t end there, it goes further. The front step was only the first of two places that needed railings. Next up was the set of steps leading down to her driveway. Those steps were more traditional, but still dangerous for a little old lady to navigate safely. Through circumstances and compromise, I decided to only up railing on one side of the driveway stairs, a concession that I was happy about since it meant that only two more holes needed to be dug.

The first hole was slow going, the dirt was very dry and compacted. It took much more beating and hacking to get through the first six inches of soil. The post holes needed to be much deeper due to the length of the pipe, almost twice as deep as the front steps. After the first six inches, the soil was moister and the digging easier. Eventually, I reached a foot deep and had a foot more to go. After about four more inches, I experienced what I had dreaded. PLUNK! The post hole digger had met a large rock.

I pounded the rock with every large heavy thing I had to try and break it, but it would not budge. Suddenly, I was looking at a halt in progress, I could go no deeper. I considered back filling the hole and forgetting that railing, it was only marginally important anyway. But then I had another idea. Mrs. Dillon’s husband worked for Nashville Gas for over 20 years and had a load of tools for iron pipe. I quickly found a pipe cutter and after making some measurements, I chopped seven inches off the bottom of the pipe. The pipe was going to be plenty deep anyway, so the extra inches only meant the last posthole wasn’t going to have to be so deep since it was seven inches shorter as well.

With the finish line in my sights, I dove into the last hole. Now they say, Murphy was an optimist, but I am pretty sure he was a cynic just like me. Well, as I can normally expect, is something hasn’t gone horribly wrong already, the last thing you have to do usually will and the last post hole was no exception. At first, the dirt just wanted to crumble and the posthole digger couldn’t grip the dirt enough to pull it out, so I had to tear the dirt up with the tool and scoop it out by hand. After about four inches of digging– PING! I began hitting stuff that had to be pounded and dug out by hand. Inch by inch I ended up tearing up by hand, reaching into the dirt and working free stones, bricks and large pieces of glass.

The last post hole was not giving up without a fight and I had to go once more into the breach. Eventually, I felt a sense of victory as I tore out the last remaining piles of dirt and brick. After many hours of sweat and tears I had finally reached my final task, the final hand railing… only to discover the my calculations were off on the angle of the steps. Instead of a perfect 45 degree angle that I calculated, the steps ended up being much steeper, and the fittings that I used to construct the railing was going to have to change, that meant an evening run to Home Depot, which I hoped was still open.

I popped in and grabbed the parts I determined I needed, only to get back and realize that forgot one part. I considered once again abandoning the project and calling it a night. The sun had already set and I was working under the illumination of my truck’s headlights. But I knew I couldn’t just keep putting it off. I have a horrible track record when it comes to completing things, so I purpose for the happiness of my sweet old neighbor, that this labor of love would get finished that night.

Well I got the project finished, the posts were set and the concrete poured. I didn’t cheat the project, I gave it 110% Something I wouldn’t have even done for myself. I am prone to quit and abandon things too easily; mostly because I make them too complicated to begin in the first place, but ultimately, I felt plugged into a different life, a Life that didn’t want to quit, a Life that loved a little old lady and was willing to go the extra mile for her.

You would probably think that after such an experience I would be able to sit back and enjoy the fruits of my labor, to see the smile on an old ladies face, to know how much she feels loved and cared for by the Lord, but I feel altogether different. Much like Oskar Schindler as portrayed in the movie Schindle’s List, at the end of the film as he sees the faces of all of those Jews he saved, he begins to weep bitterly, “I could have done more,” he says, “I could have done more.” While my feeling is not as remorseful as Oskar’s it is the same. In moments where I feel that I am experiencing and building genuine community, I see so much opportunity. There are so many people who are broken and in need, who would know the love of the Father, if more of His people would exercise to show it.

I am cheif among the sluggards, drugged and stupefied by some sense of religious obligations and not motivated by a pure Love that is sourced in the divine. Something deep is calling out in me to love with reckless abandon. To meet the broken and battered of this world and extend a warm hand of love to them. Why after so many years of pursuing my faith in such purely doctrinal terms, following forms and practices that don’t reach beyond the walls of the church to speak and care for the lowly ones in this world, why now is the Lord stirring within me in this way?

I can’t help but reflect on a something I read this morning as I pressed deeper into my search for the Jesus that is revealed in the Bible, it was a portion in the gospel according to Matthew, where Jesus had been performing miracles, healing the broken; something that drew the broken to Jesus by the thousands. At the end of chapter 9 in verse 36 it says, “And seeing the crowds, He was moved with compassion for them because they were harassed and cast away like sheep not having a shepherd.” Continuing in verse 37 and 38, “Then He said to His disciples, The harvest is great, but the workers few. Therefore, beseech the Lord of the harvest that he would thrust out workers into His harvest.”

I have always heard this verse used in the context of winning souls or converts, but I don’t think that I ever registered the characterization of the “harvest” here. The harvest that moved him with compassion was the throngs of broken people who were in need of healing. These verses are followed immediately, in chapter 10, with Jesus giving authority to the disciples to heal people and sending out to do just that. Jesus, who is the Lord of the harvest, thrust out new workers, and the harvesting work they were doing was to “proclaim, saying, the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons…” (Mat. 10: 7&8).

But that wasn’t was struck me, what struck me was 9:36 when it says he was moved with compassion for the crowds because they had been “harassed”, one commentary suggests that the Greek word for harass here is related to a practice of skinning a sheep. The religious leaders did not take care of the people, instead the robbed them of their comfort and displaced them, leaving them to wander. It was these broken people the Jesus chose to reveal the kingdom to, these people without a shepherd. I can’t help but wonder why it seems the churches today aren’t filled to the brim with broken people.

In Nashville, we have churches on nearly every corner and I see the people coming in and going out, most are not the broken and the lowly. As a matter of fact, I have been a part of churches that seemed to weed out the needy ones, making the church an uncomfortable place to be. In my life, I have been ministered to more often by the broken and lowly in the church, those without respect, who live a life poured out on others while the people who are given the first place in the church are those who have it all together and can afford their rent and own a car.

Perhaps this is the last posthole in the church, the recovery of love. As I am learning, this love is not an easy way to go, because it demands everything from you. This exercise of this love is full of pitfalls and obstacles. But if we could begin to see how radically different life would be if we didn’t worry about stock markets and housing markets, if the only economy the concerned us was the economy of God, something that is building itself up in love, how radical would that be? What if we didn’t care about all the things the world cares about? What if 100% of our energy was exercised to actively love people, what would that look like to the world? Why not find out?