Her father was a Muslim (officially). He also was one of the kindest and most compassionate people I have ever met (in truth). Today I tried to explain to his five year old daughter why he is never coming home ever again. I guess I was also trying to explain to his wife the same concept at an adult level. He was tragically killed in an automobile pileup on Wednesday afternoon.
This muslim fellow was an amazing person. He lived in the moment, embracing everyone who came into his path, especially children. All the children loved him. Interestingly enough, he and his wife are well surrounded by folks from the International church, and we were loving back on him . . . and he was joyful, but not at peace . . . and he and I were starting to dialogue about truth, spiritual things, God, the differences between Islam and Christianity, and why there are so many arrogant people that call themselves christian.
All those conversations are now finished. He was killed almost instantly on Wednesday just as his wife and 5 year daughter were getting on an airplane in England to return here to the hairy armpit after a two week holiday. Folks from ICS had to meet them at the airport to give them the tragic news. And then she asked me to come and explain to the child why daddy was not coming home again.
I am way out of my comfort zone. Because I am little like the man we are discussing here. Kids don’t love me, nor am I compassionate and kind. I am much more the snarly kind of pastor (or vicar as they call me). I am the kind that thinks he has most of the right answers, but has little of the character that should come with it. I am the kind that teaches the bible and theology as pretty much black and white stuff, while life itself is only shades of grey. I am the kind that talks lots and lives little. The 29 year old father/husband we are discussing was a better man than me. And all his wife wants to know, is this, “is he OK?” “Is he alright?” “Will I see him again?”
These are not questions that I can answer since I am not God, but I suspect I have answers that she would rather not hear. The other questions I have are about us as a church, and should we have been more direct? More pushy? More shark-like in our evangelism? And I come up with the same answers every time, that you have to be relationally close enough to bear the weight of discussing eternity and God. It just can’t happen any other way. We were getting there, but in the end we were too late.
Life has been tremendously sad since we received the news of his death. There is little hope that he embraced our God in the manner that we believe God must be embraced. And we certainly bear some responsibility here. That salt, was burning in the wound today, as I tried to explain why daddy wasn’t coming home again ever.
This muslim fellow was an amazing person. He lived in the moment, embracing everyone who came into his path, especially children. All the children loved him. Interestingly enough, he and his wife are well surrounded by folks from the International church, and we were loving back on him . . . and he was joyful, but not at peace . . . and he and I were starting to dialogue about truth, spiritual things, God, the differences between Islam and Christianity, and why there are so many arrogant people that call themselves christian.
All those conversations are now finished. He was killed almost instantly on Wednesday just as his wife and 5 year daughter were getting on an airplane in England to return here to the hairy armpit after a two week holiday. Folks from ICS had to meet them at the airport to give them the tragic news. And then she asked me to come and explain to the child why daddy was not coming home again.
I am way out of my comfort zone. Because I am little like the man we are discussing here. Kids don’t love me, nor am I compassionate and kind. I am much more the snarly kind of pastor (or vicar as they call me). I am the kind that thinks he has most of the right answers, but has little of the character that should come with it. I am the kind that teaches the bible and theology as pretty much black and white stuff, while life itself is only shades of grey. I am the kind that talks lots and lives little. The 29 year old father/husband we are discussing was a better man than me. And all his wife wants to know, is this, “is he OK?” “Is he alright?” “Will I see him again?”
These are not questions that I can answer since I am not God, but I suspect I have answers that she would rather not hear. The other questions I have are about us as a church, and should we have been more direct? More pushy? More shark-like in our evangelism? And I come up with the same answers every time, that you have to be relationally close enough to bear the weight of discussing eternity and God. It just can’t happen any other way. We were getting there, but in the end we were too late.
Life has been tremendously sad since we received the news of his death. There is little hope that he embraced our God in the manner that we believe God must be embraced. And we certainly bear some responsibility here. That salt, was burning in the wound today, as I tried to explain why daddy wasn’t coming home again ever.
