COMPANY Monday, May 19, 2014 We were standing in the middle of the dark street about midnight. It’s not a part of town I would recommend that anyone stand mid-street after midnight. But, her loved was dying and she needed help, more than usual it seemed. When I drove up, every parking space on the narrow street anywhere near the house was already taken. Dark, shadowy, ghost-like figures of people were standing in small groups everywhere, little children playing like it was noon, not night. On my way up the sidewalk, I passed a man inhaling some kind of smoke out of a two liter Mountain Dew bottle. “Hey, man!” he stutter-slurred at me, like he’d known me all of his life. He extended his hand but was so impaired he couldn’t take mine when I responded in kind as I passed. Later, after finding out what I thought the lady needed most, I’d gone to the car to make a call I knew wouldn’t work that time of night. When, as expected, the call reached no one, I summoned the strength to get out of the car, walk back up the dark street and go tell her I’d try again in the morning. She saw me coming and met me halfway. It was so dark I could barely see her face on a street with no lights. When I told her my efforts had failed, I promised her that hospice would still be there for her. I didn’t know I’d be returning in two hours when her loved one finally passed. When I made the promise about being present, she asked, “You’ll be here to keep us company?” That’s what she really needed, and wanted. There were a lot of people, a lot of decisions that were hers alone to make, a family that didn’t get along too well and a deeply loved relative who was dying. What she needed, and wanted, was to not be alone in the middle of all that company. She’d even take the company of a total stranger. It still fascinates me how we can be in the middle of a crowd and feel alone. Even a crowd of family sometimes. Loneliness, a man once told me in one of the loneliest times of my life, is not the absence of crowds but the absence of meaningful relationships. The lady in the crowd wanted company. I once heard about a little girl who wouldn’t go to sleep one night. She was afraid of the dark. Her mother tried to reassure that she’d be OK. “Mommy is right down the hall,” she said. “Besides, God is always with you.” “I know mommy,” the little girl said. “I just wish God had some skin on.” It is not good that man or woman or child be alone. As much as I like my privacy and need solitude, I’m not at my best when I stay alone too long. Demons thrive in the darkness of isolation. When she asked if I’d keep her company, the woman on the dark street had me at “company.” I couldn’t, wouldn’t, say “No.” I’d have no magic words or potion to resurrect her loved one or fix her family, just the will to keep a simple promise to be there. The very last recorded words of Jesus in the gospels are these: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” The greatest anticipation of hope is that “God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them” (Revelation 21:3). Jesus was God with skin on. Salvation is what happens when we make room for God to keep God’s promise to keep us company.
Posted on: Mon, 19 May 2014 11:45:57 +0000
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