The unpredictable stuff of life
By Anna Hernandez
I'm
one of those people who seem to have two vocations, for which I often curse
God. There are days when everything looks like discipleship, and days when nothing
at all will do. Mostly, though, it looks a lot like customer service. I work
in an Episcopal bookstore, and 35 hours a week I show up, and deal with whomever
God sends through the door -- no receptionist or office door to hide behind.
You walk in, you get me and, like it or not, I get you. At best, it's a really
challenging pastoral ministry. At its worst, it's a day filled with too many
phone calls and e-mails, and careless, thoughtless people. Like the man who
asked me, "If you were a woman, what color Bible would you like?" I try to hold my tongue, but am not always successful. I try not to be mean to people (it makes them feel bad), but neither will I let myself be stepped on (it makes me feel bad). I helped that man to the best of my ability, and moved on to the next person. He's still a customer, and we like each other. Discipleship?
There's an old man, who comes in about four times a year, monopolizes my time, totally disrupts the store and all who are therein, and never buys a thing. He yells, "Where's the girl? Is the girl still here? I need help, I want a Bible. I can't see, I need large print. The girl can help me." He's going deaf, too, so he yells, and people stare at him (and at me, I guess to make sure that I'm aware of the situation). He doesn't smell great, and he looks like he could really use a new pair of shoes. He asks a question, but talks over the answer, and then he asks it again, louder, and talks over the answer. After he leaves, people tell me how amazed they are that I am so patient with him. My boss says, "That one, he will get you your wings."
This man's been coming into the store for about five years or so, and I've never been able to help him before. When he comes in, I tend to leap headfirst into the pit. We go through the usual drill: I show him all of the large print and giant print Bibles we've got, and he rejects them all. Only, the last time, he didn't reject them all. He took one from me, and opened it up about 3 inches from his face, and said, "I like this one. I'll take it." Well, I guided him over to the cash register, rang it up, found someone to help him out to the street, and moved on to the next person.
I wonder how he gets along, and if I'll ever see him again. I wonder why I don't mind helping some folks, but others I don't want to help at all. I mean, Jesus didn't wander around asking people, "Whatchya gonna look at after I heal your blindness?" Or, "If you are going to listen to that hip-hop crap, I am not going to heal your deafness, young man!"
Almost every day, there's a close encounter. Sometimes they haunt me. A woman I'd never seen before walked up to the cash register, and handed me two books to ring up. She said, "I lost my baby. I was at 8 months. This is my first day back at work." In that kind of moment, what can you do? God's calling, and you're having an attack of low self-esteem, which is manifesting itself as a huge urge to fly away, because you are not prepared for this. I took a deep breath, looked up and said, "I'm so sorry, that's an impossible situation." Then I remembered a book of meditations written for that very thing, and she looked at me, and we both tried not to cry. I asked if she'd like to see it, and she said yes, so I went and got it and handed it to her. She sighed, and said in an undertone, "I didn't see this." After a quick glance, she bought the one I'd fetched, walked out, and I've never seen her again. I wonder how she's doing. She seemed pretty strong. There was something about her that made me feel like she was going to be alright no matter what I did, or didn't, do.
Some days, discipleship looks like that woman; devastated beyond belief, yet reaching out for my hand. It hasn't always occurred to me that people might want to reach out for my hand, that my hand might be a lifeline: It's not actually my hand they're reaching out for. I don't even always recognize it. When you show up, miracles occasionally happen; I'm just the one lucky enough to be there. It's no small miracle I was able to remember where the book for that woman was. I think, though, that if I were a real disciple, I'd just be able to give her the damn book because she needed it, thus avoiding the mammon portion of our show. However, that's not the way of the world, so I took her money, and moved on to the next person. I often wish I could give people the books they need.
My other vocation is as a musician. It's an awful lot like customer service. As a musician, though, I actually feel discipleship more of the time. Most of my gigs are for worship services. Every third Sunday at my church (St. Clement's in Hell's Kitchen, NYC), I'm the music leader. The Clementines are a great singing congregation, and I like it there. I try to be mindful in planning the hymns, try to avoid the more annoying texts and tunes that used to fascinate Christians, and sometimes (sigh) still do. I hear the people singing and am often moved, and when it works like it's supposed to, I can see that they are also moved. We try to stay open to the urgings of the Spirit. Sometimes, I'll start stomping out a beat, or playing a drum pattern to a hymn that's never been previously associated with any percussion, and other people join in; some just singing, some just stamping their feet, some doing both, and by the last verse, we are all having a pretty good time. Discipleship?
Don't get me wrong, being a musician isn't always a picnic. I've been hired to play at conferences to provide music for worship, and gathering music in order to build community, and then the worship service I've planned (at their request) is a two-hour meeting instead, people talk over the gathering music and ignore it, and I think to myself, "Why am I here?" Leo Tolstoy once said: "I had intended to go to God and I found my way into a stinking bog, which evokes in me only those feelings of which I am most afraid: disgust, malice, and indignation."
When I feel useless, ignored, and like I do not matter at all, I tend to get impatient and frustrated. Headfirst into the stinking bog. Glub, glub. But you know what? There's always someone else in the bog, too. Last time, I met another musician. So, we stuck together, and the experience became less irritating because I made a new friend!
Oftentimes my worlds collide: Once I sold a priest some books in the afternoon, and saw him later on in a church where I had a gig. Afterwards, he came up to me to tell me that he liked what I'd done. I said, "Thanks. You got some great books today." He looked at me like he'd never seen me before, and I must be crazy, and said, "How do you know I bought books today?" I said, "I sold them to you," and he gave me a dismissive look, and said "Oh, I never look at the help." Then he walked away.
Definitely a blow to discipleship. I'm sure he did like what I'd done musically, and I've found that people are mostly clueless as to how I've been affected by what they say, and they usually don't mean harm. But discipleship is nigh unto impossible if one person denies the other one's existence, especially if I'm the other one. You need at least two people in order to have discipleship, and maybe that's why those disciples went out in pairs. There are times when my ego is too little to help me. There are other times that I'm sure my ego will interfere in a situation, but somehow, it's not a problem. Even the old man bought a Bible, and that was surely the grace of God.
Discipleship seems to be a slippery little devil: You can't predict it, and you really can't expect it to happen; you can't live without it, and you can be fairly certain that it will not be the way you would want it, but it does happen, and it's almost always a surprise.