When the church we're with first started, we knew that we wanted to be serving people. We wanted to reach out to the broken, the left out, the looked over, and the left behind. That's what Jesus did, and so that's what we wanted to do. We had a saying, and it went something like this: "You know, the world will tell you to buy a nice house, have a good car, enjoy your family, close the garage after work and let the world go to hell in a hand-basket around you; but Jesus didn't call us to that." In short, the mission Jesus was sending us on was generally opposed to the American culture in which we found ourselves.
After an especially long day sometime last week, I was thinking about this saying, about closing the garage door, building my own little kingdom in our house, and enjoying life -forgetting about the beautiful and broken city all around us.
As I watched our garage door close, and then re-open of its own accord (because it's a little jacked up, nothing really miraculous going on, really...we actually did this dance about three times before I got it to close), I realized that the garage door of my heart doesn't work right, either. I can set up boundaries and tell people "no," and I must, because I'm a creature, not the Creator. I'm a messenger of the Gospel, not its Messiah. But it's hard for me to close the door of my heart to the hurting.
I began to praise God that it's hard for me to put up those fences. It's hard to look at the faces of the people around me that are hurting and ignore them. It's hard not to weep for Shirley, who stands on the corner of my exit off the highway most every day, trying to get enough food and money to live while she waits for her disability to come through. It's hard not to get angry at the implicit (and sometimes explicit) racism I see and hear in my streets. It's hard not to love the kids across the street, who are so sweet, and who apparently have no fear of cars when crossing our street.
I have to close the garage door some nights so I can live the gospel with the family the Lord has appointed me to take care of; but we're a light to this city. When our garage door closes, it's not without remembering the beautiful and broken city that Jesus loves and that Jesus is coming to rebuild someday soon. It's not without praying for our city with my beautiful daughter and gorgeous wife.
As missionaries, we must put our families above the ministry to the city, lest we show the world a cheap and thin Gospel. After all, what does it mean to be adopted in to God's family if the "family" we have is superficial and filled with glossed-over hurt and disappointment? So, we must close our garage doors for a time and focus on those who live within our homes.
However, we must take our families on mission to minister and serve those around us. Our garage doors need to be going up to make room for block parties, to open up so that we can pray and walk our streets, to make way for cars that will taxi folks who don't have a ride otherwise, to open up so that we can bless people with the blessings the Lord has given us.
Thank you, Lord, for our-up garage door. May our hearts similarly close difficultly, lest we forget your Mission. Drive us to love as you loved, to serve as you served, and to trust Your Power all the while, King of Kings.
Living on mission with the King is messy and wonderful - encouraging and exhausting. Live in His power, ye His saints, and rest in His grace.
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