(I apologize for the length and the delay, but this post deserved both; please read to the end. ADDITIONAL NOTE: we have made it a habit to change everyone's names to protect their identity, but in this case, our friend's name simply had too much value to not include. Please don't sue. ;-)
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Somewhere southeast of Chicago
"Well, today's the trip's climax."
"That's not necessarily true; we've still got plenty of big places left to hit like St. Louis and Memphis."
"True enough, but this is the farthest north we'll get, the largest city we'll hit, and probably the most thoroughly secularized place we'll be in, too. It seems like it should be the climax, but I suppose we'll just have to see how the day goes."
Well, after a rather rocky start, I think our conversation in the car very much foreshadowed the day's events.
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After our meeting with Jiffy, we quickly packed up and bolted. She had left reading the back intently, and we were content to leave her with the DVDs for now. The idea of her finding something on the back of the DVD she didn't like and wheeling around for a confrontation wasn't appealing at the moment, so we just hoped that the message would find it's mark while we went on to other things.
We looked at our watches in disappointment; did we really only have TWO HOURS left in Chicago? Here we were, lugging around a bulky sign, at least a mile away from our car, having handed out resources to TWO people, with virtually no time left in the city. Things were not looking good. Chicago was going to be a bust, it was clear.
"Man, this was supposed to be our biggest day, and we haven't done jack!" I complained to Alan.
"Well, let's just go put this stuff up and hit a coffee shop or two. It'd be a shame to be in Chicago and not hit any coffee shops." I agreed and we re-emerged from the underground parking deck half an hour later and set out to find a coffee shop or two.
We settled on the first one we saw, the Corner Shop Cafe, which sat right underneath one of Chicago's many elevated train tracks. As we walked in, I got the sinking feeling that this place would be a waste of time - it was definitely not set up with the idea of engaging strangers in mind, being closer to a Panera than your typical "coffee shop."
Just the same, they were selling lemonade and we were tired, so we stuck around. Things looked a little brighter when I noticed that there was a long bench seat with several small tables lined up in front, and at one of those tables sat a young woman, alone, reading a book. Since the table next to her was open, Alan and I went and sat down, both of us, I'm sure, trying to decide what our approach should be. Alan got a call so, in the meantime, I decided to ask her a casual question.
"What are you reading?" She turned to me, showed me the title of the book, and then said something in French that I didn't catch at all.
"So, are you learning French?" I asked.
"Actually, I am French."
A couple seconds later, Alan joined the conversation and I briefed him on our new friend's bio. She was French, from Paris, here in the US visiting a friend, and had been in the US (to Richmond) once before. We told her about our road trip, talked about traveling abroad, and asked her what her impressions were of the city. She and Alan discussed the author (a Frenchman) of Alan's favorite book, The Little Prince, and I asked her about her interest in law. She had been to Oxford and I tried to bring up the Oxford debate, but there was no bite.
After awhile, I was beginning to dread that we would not be able to turn things to a spiritual discussion, but Alan wisely decided to ask her "our question:"
"So we've been asking everyone this question along our road trip, seeing what different kind of answers we get and what we could learn from other people. And the question is, 'if you could tell us any one thing, what would it be.' It doesn't have to be a grand, universal answer, but it certainly can be."
"Hmmm.... Let me see..... I think that I would say 'enjoy the moment. Enjoy where you are right now and try to find the good in it.' Because, if you do that, you'll look back on things much more fondly. Now, of course, you have to plan for the future some too, but you can still do that and enjoy the moment."
"That's not a bad answer. There's alot of truth in that," we both said.
We discussed it a little further and then she asked about other answers we had gotten.
"Well, we had one waitress tell us not to baptize our neighbor's cat!" we offered, to which there was some laughter and an exchange of the story. She was still interested: "What others have you had?"
"Well, one guy told us that life was meaningless, which was disappointing," Alan and I recalled.
"Well, yeah, that is kind of disappointing because it seems like that's sort of a dark way of looking at it, but he is at least kind of right. I mean, not everything in life has meaning, so at least if you don't think anything has meaning, you're not busy looking for meaning where there isn't any. What about you, though? What do you think?" There we were! She had not only given us something to respond to, she had then willingly turned over the floor to us with her question!
"Mmmm! Well I hope you really wanted an answer to that question because part of the reason we ask other people is not only to learn from what they have to say, but also hoping that they'll ask us," Alan said.
"Yes because, you see, Alan and I are Christians, and so when we look at the world we find meaning in everything from the most mundane daily activities to the great ones. The idea is that, when you're a Christian, everything done for the glory of God becomes a meaningful activity with eternal value."
"Ah, eternal value. Yeah, I can sort of understand that since, for me personally, one of my major concerns is being eco-friendly. That just seems to me to have great meaning and to have some lasting value since the world lives on long after we're gone. I used to go to church when I was little, and my entire family is Christian, so I know something about Christianity but I haven't been to church in the past several years because there were just some things about what was being said that I couldn't swallow."
"Like what?"
"Well, for instance, the Trinity. I just can't figure that out. It makes no sense how something can be three people and one person at the same time." Hmmm..... A discussion of the Trinity did not really seem to me like the place to start with someone who wasn't a Christian; it seemed that she was probably missing something much more fundamental.
"No, I can understand that completely. There's some parts that just don't seem to add up at first, and that can be one of them. It's difficult, there's no question."
"Yeah, so because of that and some other things, I just decided to leave religion altogether, and I've been able to have a meaningful life outside of that by dedicating my life to something else lasting. Besides, why believe Christianity when there's so many other options out there? I mean, how can you be sure it's right when there's Islam and Judaism and so many other things. They're all just saying the same things." Now here was something we could really hit hard without getting into a really heady discussion:
"Well, it seems that most people would agree that there are only three real viable religions in the world today and...." she gave me a look that said very clearly, "I disagree," so I changed tactics. "Well, okay, let's throw them all in there; my point won't be any different. There is one feature in Christianity that is completely different from any other religion in the world, and that's the idea of Grace. Have you ever heard of this?" She nodded that she had, with that kind of 'I've heard this before' expression.
"Well do you know what it means? It's the reason that Alan and I here believe Christianity because it resonates with the world we see around us. You see, we live in a screwed up place where no one can be trusted; I can't trust you, I can't trust my family, I can't trust Alan here (great guy though he is), and I certainly can't trust myself. In the end, all of those people will fail me at some point. So if I'm going to put my trust in something, it's going to have to be higher than myself. And not only that, but the idea is that, if we're ever going to be allowed to live in community with God, we're going to have to try to find someway to fill the breach that's between us."
"The problem is, you and I can't! We can't help ourselves and we can't trust anyone else to help us either; everyone will fail. But God, who had no responsibility to help us, decided that he would do for us what we couldn't do for ourselves. So where every other religion in the world gives you a check list and says, 'do this if you want to go to Heaven and live with God,' Christianity gives you the rules and says, 'you can't ever possibly do this, but don't worry, I'll do it for you and then all you have to do is to trust in me and I will save you no matter what you've done.' You might have screwed up horribly, but God is willing to help you anyway. That's what Grace is."
Here, Alan popped into the conversation: "And with your interest in law, you should probably understand this, because of course, God couldn't just ignore all of the evil things that we've done; then he would be unjust. Evil had been done, and someone had to pay the penalty for it, but since we are finite and God is infinite, there was no way that we could ever fulfill what needed to be done. So God, in his mercy, decided to take the penalty upon himself and pay the penalty for us that we could not pay ourselves. So, if we claim Christ's life and death as our own life and death, then when God looks at us, He does not see all of the evil things that we've done, but instead he sees the perfect life that Christ lived, and we are acceptable to Him." I was thankful Alan had realized that we could probably notch this conversation up a level from where we had typically been speaking; she wanted more than just the basics, and this dialogue brought that to light.
She had been listening very patiently and attentively and now looked at us thoughtfully. "You know, I don't think I've ever heard it put that way before." She was thoroughly intrigued and moved in a little closer. She wanted to know more. Success one! Now we just needed to follow up.
"Well this is the core idea behind all of Christianity, and I'm afraid the institutional church occasionally does a bad job of communicating something different," I offered, remembering her previous statement that she had been to church when she was younger; how sad that she had been able to go to any church for any length of time and yet this was her first exposure to true Grace!
"Well, I think that God probably isn't quite that interested in individual people. I mean, how could a huge God be interested in little people? How would you know? Now, don't get me wrong, I believe in God, but I think he's probably not in any particular religion but is just kind of there in nature keeping things going."
Alan had this one covered, "You know, it's interesting that you say that because we had one person, when we asked them our first version of the question - if you could tell the world one thing, what would it be - he said that he didn't want to tell the world anything because he thought that true value was to be found in personal relationships. Yet, when he began telling us about his conceptions of God, he wanted a God that didn't do anything but give universal statements - no personal aspect. But, while God is that kind of God in the sense that he's all powerful, watches over everything, etc., he is also a very personal God."
"But how can he be? You can't communicate with him, at least not like you can with someone else."
Now it was my turn: "Some of that may be true, but Alan and I would say that you can have a very real and personal relationship with God. And of course we believe that the man Jesus was also literally God, which means that there was a point in history where we could have communicated with God just like I'm communicating with you, and we're looking forward to the time when we're in Heaven and will communicate like that with Him again."
"Now, in the meantime, communication is a little different and that's the part that we can't really explain fully because you just kind of have to experience it, but it's there. One of the primary ways that I find it there is through my relationships with other people. For instance, I love my family and my friends very much, and there's this particular girl who I've dated for three years that I think is pretty swell, and I find that when I experience love and joy with them, it gives me a far greater understanding of God's love for me and some things that I knew only intellectually before now make way more sense and I can really see them. The Bible says, 'taste and see that the Lord is good,' and that's kind of the idea here. So I think that relationships with other people are one of the ways that we get a little window into something much larger and greater, and it gives my relationships with other people much greater meaning, too."
"Then, of course, he communicates to us through fellow Christians, through prayer, and most explicitly and importantly, through his holy word - the Bible."
"Yeah," Alan chimed back in, "Take Denny here, for instance. I know him, but that's only because he chose to tell me about himself, not because I analyzed him and figured everything about him out. If he hadn't told me about himself, there's no way I could know about him. So it's the same with God since God is a person. We didn't just figure all of this stuff out, he told it to us in the Bible."
She was still listening carefully, but here she protested: "But the Bible was still written by men."
I caught this up. "Well, yes and no. I mean, that's true in as far as it was men who wrote it down and men who translated it. And certainly there might be some errors in the text now from a scribe slightly miscopying something or translation errors, which I'm sure you can understand since you speak two languages; some things in French just don't translate well to English and vis versa. That said, we believe that the original authors of the Bible were inspired by God to say exactly what God wanted them to say and that the Bible we have today is pretty accurate to what they originally wrote - accurate enough that we can base our lives on it."
She seemed satisfied by this answer and moved on to something new. "But in the end, it doesn't really make that big of a difference, surely? I mean, I would still be doing all of the things that a religious person does, and even if helping the world isn't eternal, why do I care to do something eternal when the world already lasts almost forever?"
From here on out I did most of the talking: "Well, you're very right to notice that you would be doing alot of the same things, but the meaning behind them would now be totally changed. You see, Christianity is very concerned with the motive behind something, so that a Christian and a non-Christian may well both help a homeless man, but if the Christian is doing it to bring glory to God while the non-Christian is hoping to win approval or even just to be nice, then God sees the Christian's action as a good action and the non-Christian's action as a bad one. Not only that, but that's why we're in so much trouble to begin with. You see, Jesus came along and said that not only were the actions of murder and adultery bad, but even the thoughts of lust and hatred were seen as evil and deserving of death."
"Well, the earth is as eternal a thing as I want to spend my time helping."
"But the earth isn't eternal. Even modern science tells us that the world will someday end, and with it will end all of the great actions you've done to save it if they weren't put into the service of something greater. Besides, what do you care? If you're dead, it's not like you're getting anything out of it anyway."
"Think of Achilles, the greatest warrior to ever live, a man whose name we still (some of us) remember in song and poetry; he set out in his life to make sure he was remembered, but what does he care now that he's dead? It ended up doing him no good. We've only got about 80 years on this planet, which amounts to less than one page in most history textbooks; in the great ocean of time, our lives our just a single, insignificant drop that won't make more than a few ripples (if we're lucky). After that, we have to answer eternally for how was used that time."
"But couldn't I just serve him without getting involved in any particular religion? I mean, doesn't he just want followers and he shouldn't really care how we follow him?"
"Well, it might be nice if the answer were 'yes,' but you see, this is the other reason Christians ought to feel a real urgency about sharing this message with everyone, because there's a positive and a negative side to the message."
"Well let's start with the negative."
"The negative is that, if you reject God and his Son, then you will be sent to a place of eternal suffering, misery, and torture."
"Yes, Hell. And some people definitely deserve it."
Thinking that she was going to justify 'bad men' going to Hell while 'good men' were saved, I decided to pre-empt the argument: "Yes, even we as people can admit that people like Hitler and Stalin deserved Hell," (here she nodded) "but again we're told that not only do they deserve Hell, but all of us deserve Hell, too, since we disobeyed God's commands."
It appears that my pre-emption may have been moot as she freely admitted this point.
"Oh, I agree with that completely. I deserve to go to Hell and I know it." This was certainly a nice admission to have! We didn't have to convince her of her own need for help, and that meant things were looking way up!
"Well, we have been offered a way out, and if we believe that Christ's life and death were sufficient to pay for our sins, then we are safe from Hell. This should motivate Christians to really get out and share this belief so that others don't experience that fate. And then the positive side is that, if we trust in God to take our evils from us and help us, then we are given a place of eternal joy, happiness, and communion with Him. And out of the two, I would prefer go there. But that can only come through the one, true God."
Alan chimed back in: "because as Jesus said, 'I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through me.' "
Our friend then sat and pondered for a long time. Eventually she spoke again, "Well... ummm.... I think I agree with absolutely everything you're saying, but I'm just not sure I really want to be involved with religion again."
"Hey listen," I said, "I can understand that, but I think you might be talking about the institutions here, which is a little different. The institutional church is run by people, and people are greedy, flawed, and evil. That means that a lot of times the church has a tendency to become greedy, flawed, and evil itself." She nodded her head vigorously in agreement: "I can remember times where Christians would just pass by the homeless and act completely repulsed and wouldn't even look at them, and I wanted to say, 'come on! They don't bite!' My grandmother was really like that. And I just can't stand that. I didn't want to be a hypocrite like the rest of them, so I left the church. But this is new, and I think I agree with it."
"Well again, I can understand that, but let me leave you with this: I'm not advising you to give 'religion' a second look; it's not the real-deal anyway. The church does not define Christianity; Christianity is not determined by a preacher or a pope, but rather it's defined by God who revealed his Word in the Bible. So, I'm not sitting here telling you to go back to 'religion.' What I am telling you is that I think you should give Christianity and the Bible a second look. I think you will find true hope, comfort, and grace in there."
This seemed to be a novel idea to her, and I could see a light bulb going off in her head, so I continued further. "You know, I've actually got my Bible with me here in my backpack, and I'd be more than happy to give it to you if you would like it."
"You - you carry your Bible around with you right there in your backpack?! Are you kidding?!"
"Yup. And you can have it if you want it. I've got plenty to spare."
"Well I wouldn't want to take it from you, but yes, yes, I'd like it. But you have to sign it for me!"
"Not a problem at all; I'll also mark the book of John for you to read. What's your name?" Seeing that she was shocked at my willingness to dog-ear pages and write in a Bible, I told her, "Now this particular copy of the Bible is definitely printed by men. Crossway - those are the people who printed it. So the pages are not holy; it's the ideas contained in here that have great signifcance." Okay with this explanation, she gave me her name and I began to write.
And what a grand name it was! "Ca-mee-ya," she said, "But it's spelled C-A-M-I-L-L-E." I was writing this down in her Bible and then looked up, "Camille? Ha! My girlfriend who I was telling you about earlier is named Camille!" How providential that I should be writing a note to a Camille! I printed a brief note in her Bible, signed my name, left her with some verses, and gave her the Bible. She was happy - nay, giddy - to receive it, and took it into her possession with great care. "Thank you so much!" She said, and we all excitedly parted ways with firm handshakes and broad smiles.
We had spent over an hour and a half with Camille and now we had to be going, but as we left, Alan and I felt euphoric. We talked excitedly on the way back to the car, where we both said a prayer for Camille and her future. There were so many questions answered in this encounter: almost every previous conversation we had had on this trip found it's way into our conversation with Camille,;Chicago had indeed become the highlight of the trip; and we could see God's purpose stamped on everything in our conversation and throughout our trip so far. This was just confirmation on every level that we were right where God wanted us to be.
Later, as I was reflecting on the situation, I was a little unsettled by the fact that we hadn't "prayed the prayer" with her, as I was trying to decide whether we should speak of her as a "convert" or not. Everything about the conversation and the feeling of the moment and the analysis afterwards said "yes" except for that. This was especially on my mind after one of our hosts (who has really dedicated her life to evangelistic endeavors) said that in all of her years of evangelism, she's never "prayed the prayer" with anyone, and that she was upset by this.
But as I thought about it, it seems to me that Alan and I had taken her as far as we could. We had done everything that we were supposed to do in that situation, and while she did not declare on the spot in a prayer, "I'm a Christian now," she had declared it in many other ways. "The prayer" is not what makes a Christian, but rather it is the repentance before God and the reliance on his mercy as provided through his Son, and I think she had thrown herself on this wholeheartedly. I am completely convinced that God orchestrated every part of that meeting, of that conversation, and of what followed, and if she did not "pray the prayer" with us, then I am confident it was not necessary.
All of this is simply to say that I like Camilles :-)
--Michael Taunton
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