WRONG PLACE (Part 2)

What would the world look like if God’s people – and by people I primarily mean me – truly took note of the irreligious message of Jesus? What if we didn’t merely ask What Would Jesus Do but also asked Where Would Jesus Go?

How would the church change if we put aside our prejudices and headed into the places we typically walk around? What if, instead of hoping that the harvest comes to us, we went to the harvest?

Several years ago, while pastoring in Ohio, I learned how the “wrong” place can be the right place. One of my favorite eateries in our little town was a place called Flappers. There’s no getting around it—Flappers was a bar. But I loved there chicken wings, so I became a regular. Over time, I built relationships and cultivated trust there.

One day I was in Flappers with a pastor-friend when an elderly lady fell while getting up from her table. John and I jumped up from our meals and darted over to see if we could help. When we got to her, she began to cry and started pouring her heart out to us. She was battling cancer and was tired of fighting. She had lost her husband and was lonely. Now she was embarrassed that she had fallen in a public place.

A couple of minutes into her impromptu confession she looked at John and me and said, “I don’t know why I just told you all that.” We smiled and told her that we knew why she had. When we told her who we were, she expressed surprise that two pastors were eating lunch in a bar. We told her that Jesus loved her and that He had not forsaken her in her pain and loss. She broke into a fresh stream of tears as we reminded her of His love and care. And with her still sitting on that dingy floor I asked if we could pray with her and she said yes.

I can still see the scene. Two young pastors, surrounded by the wait staff, kitchen help, and bartender, kneeling beside an elderly woman in a little bar called Flappers and praying for her. To my surprise, all the employees bowed their heads as we prayed and at the conclusion of our prayer they all thanked us. In that moment I knew that John and I needed to be right where we were because we were right in the midst of the harvest.

            Where is your harvest? Who are the “wrong” people in your world? What prejudices do you need to overcome in order to minister as Jesus did? What places do you continually walk around rather than go through? Are we willing to risk our sanitized idea of what it means to be a Christian in order to follow the example of Jesus? The “wrong place” may be the very place you should be.