Tales from the Trail #23: Rescued again by the Righteous …
Walking into that early evening, with the temperatures pleasantly cool and the traffic relatively minimal (there was a brilliantly wide shoulder to walk on for most of that night’s jaunt as well), it didn’t take long for me to eventually come upon the Grace Assembly Church (on the Indianapolis side of the town of Whiteland) – a church that, even at that relatively late hour on a Friday night, happened to have a number of cars parked around back. Seeing this, I hobbled in their direction, and soon discovered that a men’s group meeting was coming to a close at that very moment, and that I had arrived just in time to approach member Jonah and tell him (and a few of his overhearing compatriots as well) about my Walk – specifically its primary purpose and its current trials. And to his great credit, even though it turned out he was a new father who wanted to get home to his family that night, Jonah allowed himself to be deeply moved by what I was doing; moved enough to offer me a ride further down the road. And that is precisely what he did – driving me all the way into the near outskirts of Indianapolis proper and even giving me a leftover pizza from his men’s meeting and buying me 2 Cliff Bars at a gas station along the way. And even though it was only a 7 mile ride, Jonah drove slowly and smoothly that night, and we were able to share quite a wonderful discussion together – about politics in general (with me encouraging him to punt the same completely, Red or Blue, in favor of being the change he wanted to see in his neighborhood instead) and about the critical role of kindness & caring in any viable community, and even about intentionally removing the church-stifled dogma from one’s spiritual life in favor of simply humbly & recklessly embodying The Way of Christ towards all the individuals we happen to encounter each day (Christian & non-Christian, friends & strangers, humans & non-humans alike). It was an admittedly brief encounter, and yet without doubt or question a powerful one for us both, and I thanked him profusely for his kindness as he dropped me off, turned around, wished me well on my Walk, and then drove back home to his wife and child …
After he departed, I sat for a bit and ate the crust off the pizza he had given me (the rest of it being flagrantly non-vegan) and munched down my Cliff bars as well, before making my way up the road a short distance to a small street-side office center, where I lay down and tried to sleep on the sidewalk there for awhile. And yet the colder temperatures inspired me to rise soon enough and walk across the street to the Faith Community Church, where two large U-Haul trucks happened to be parked – two large U-Haul trucks that happened to have been left wide open – two large U-Haul trucks which were both quite warm on the inside, and into one of which I gratefully clambered – and that one large U-Haul truck into which I immediately feel into a sound and well-wanted slumber.
Later that morning I woke with a small start, when Gary & Annie & Dean arrived at around 6am to help set-up for the great “proselytizing festival” that was apparently taking place there that day (a community affair where “everything [was] free” – as long as you were willing to talk to the church members there about accepting Jesus as one’s “only Lord & Savior”). I was able to wake smoothly from said sleep and sneak out of the U-Haul without causing them alarm or offense (it turned out that the two trucks were storing much of the stuff the church was giving away to the poor that day) and then calmly limped up to them and offered to help them set up for their event. And so it was that they heard about my Walk and exuberantly invited me to help them and attend the prayer-hour to follow. I agreed to both invitations, and it was during the latter that I more clearly learned about their true opinions about unbelievers (“Great stupidity and suffering have to come for folks to know that they need a Savior!”) as well as their mission to aggressively convert the same (“The only important part of it all is for them to be saved, so what we’ve got to do is get them here, give them something, and then repeatedly tell them about Jesus!”) …
The fervor of their resolve was quite evident from the start, and so it seemed more than prudent for me to keep my knowledge of both the Bible’s deeper (i.e. more moral) interpretations and its more practical (i.e. completely non-religious) admonitions (ironically offered by their very own Lord & Savior himself) to myself. After all, these were Good People too – a bit blinded by a smaller-Souled theocratic dogma, yes, and yet Good People nonetheless – and there was no reason to needlessly dampen their mood on what was obviously going to be such a beautiful day. And so it was that I simply answered whatever questions they asked about my Walk, and verrrrrrry subtly encouraged them all to be more humble & courageous Doers of The Way of Christ than mere proselytizers of the words of Paul. And even though I think it was pretty clear to many there that I was not in any way shape or form in harmony with their own religious bent, they offered to help me along my Way regardless, with church elder Dean then quite kindly (of his own idea & volition) giving my limping legs a lift all the way into & through the heart of Indianapolis that same mid-morning.
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