Getting and Giving

 It was the early days of our time in Japan … those days when my emotions ran from mountaintops of wonder to those low places when, if I could have FOUND the airport, I would have been on a plane headed for what I still considered “Home”.

Most of my frustrations circled around the Japanese language, and my lack of it. Why, WHY wouldn’t these people just stop blabbering gibberish and start speaking English?!?

And then, when I began to dare that I was indeed starting to pick up what a 17th century Franciscan monk called “The Devil’s Language”, reality would blindside me like it did on that Sunday morning. The ladies were talking at great length about … well about SOMETHING. There was a lot of smiling and pointing to the Bible, so I surmised we were giving our testimonies.

“Got it!” I thought to myself. I had prepared one in language school and it was in my purse, just waiting for this moment. Sure enough, one of the ladies turned to me and asked sweetly, “Ikaga desu ka?” “What do you think?”

“Of course!” I replied, with maybe a little too much enthusiasm, as I pulled my hand-written testimony out of my purse, smoothed it carefully across my lap, and began in Japanese, “I was raised in a Christian home, and so found it easy to pray and be baptized at a very young age.” 

Even as I spoke, I could feel the intensity in which they were listening, and continued with even more boldness, finally coming to the part where, “And that’s when my call to Japan was understood.”

The lady next to me coughed quietly. Ah! She wants to make a comment! I paused, and she grabbed the chance. “That was wonderful, Marsha Sensei.” She said in perfect English. “We were just discussing what we might get for our pastor’s upcoming birthday. What do you think?”

For some reason, Luke 14:6 drifted by the cobwebs in my mind, “And they could not answer Him regarding these things.”

I came across that passage again this last week, and that awkward moment so many years ago came back to the surface. I had to chuckle, but then immediately felt sad as well.  

There was Jesus, doing His thing …… what He came to do; today being healing, and wouldn’t you know, this happened to be on the Sabbath.  The poor Pharisees had no skills to deal with this man who seemed to go out of his way to break the rules.

And when Jesus suggested to them that even they might be nice enough to use some practical sense and pull their ox out of a ditch, they JUST DIDN’T GET IT!

Please understand, I’m not feeling like Jesus, but I think sometimes I’m starting to feel His frustrations. Case in point: We had a ‘tradie’ (as they call them here) come to our house to look at a leaky roof.  He’s a lovely European immigrant, just finding his way doing odd jobs and we’ll probably use him again, but the conversation went like this,

“Oh, by the way, in case you’re interested, we’re Christians.”

To which he replied proudly, “Well, I’m an atheist!”  

I just couldn’t resist and said, smiling, “Oh wow! You must have so much faith to actually profess that there is no God!”

He, like that verse in Luke, had nothing to say. But honestly, I couldn’t help but think he had probably never thought of that. I suppose I shouldn’t have said anything; after all, he wasn’t picking on me, but I wanted him to stop and think.

Isn’t that one of the first challenges of sharing the Gospel message to people who may never have heard it? We, like Jesus, want our listeners to put aside their preconceptions, open their minds and listen. 

Can’t you imagine how sad Jesus must have felt when the people He came to save, literally, just weren’t ready to even consider what He was saying?

And then in the NEXT verse (Luke 14:7), He shared the parable of the wedding feast where the invited people just couldn’t be bothered.  Their minds were made up to ignore the whole thing. And so, as I mentioned last week, the host turned and invited people who were longing for this message.  He invited them to “Come and taste, for He is good.”

Here's your prayer for the week: “Lord, please send me someone today who GETS it, who NEEDS it!” And then when He does, pull that testimony out of your purse (or your memory) and GIVE IT! 

Have a good week!!  

Marsha