::: post-protestant thoughts :::

Friday, November 19, 2004

::: she died and left him with 3 kids :::

this is an attempt at portraying what 'evangelism' looks like in my little corner of the world . . . these kinds of things are very airy . . . at best . . . in this context but take a look . . . ( i hope that it makes sense . . .)

this may be a little more off color than some of you prefer . . . but my world is actually very 'R-rated' . . . it is not sterile in any way . . . this guy at work lost his wife about a year ago from cancer . . . she died and left him with 3 kids all under the age of 12 . . . to say the least he is a little 'rough around the edges' . . . we typically talk a lot about missional living and the like and when this happened I immediately wanted to bloc about it because it typifies that concept and it illustrates 'forward movement' on this guy's part . . . let me explain like this . . . this guy (i'll call him 'mark') he is not the most communicative guy in the world but obviously hurting from the loss of his wife, raising the kids alone, drinking a lot, you get the idea . . . i have been 'dripping' on him for a long time and he knows where i am coming from . . . anyway he best form of communication is his idea of humor . . . consequently over the last few months he sends me these pictures every now and then and a blurb . . . examples:

. . . 'mark' tells me that this is his latest girl friend . . . we call her 'bubbles the baby sitter' (BTW yes this is real ... i was freaked out too she is 7' 6" tall 330lbs!) . . . then he sends me this one . . . says he got a chance to meet some of my relatives in west virginia over the weekend . . . they said to say 'hi!' . . .

. . . he knows i'm taking jonathan hunting this weekend and wants to know if this is me on my way to WV?? he says he loves the 4 wheeler!! . . .

. . . while in WV he wants me to say hi to my 'uncle billy-bob' (obviously 'uncle billy-bob' is a big fan!) . . .

. . . here's the good part . . . he knew the last few weeks were really bad at work (really bad as in corporate presidential complaint bad) . . . he knows i've had it . . . he knows that i have taken numerous hits that i shouldn't have . . . (some of them were for him) . . . in the mist of all of those dynamics i am watching him 'move' a bit closer to the Christ image i have attempted to portray . . . he is/has responded to kindness and gentleness . . . because of mark's circumstances he has been out increasing out of commission at times . . . drinking (we describe it as being at the dump) . . . (the reality is he is 'self-medicating) . . . even in the mist of the 'stuff' i can't post here . . . the evidence is that 'mark' 'sees it' and is walking toward Christ . . . the evidence is best illustrated by the picture below . . . knowing my work situation . . . he sent me this . . . obviously it speaks for itself . . .