Day 63
You’re All Wet
Porpoise are all wet. Take away the water and all you have is a dead fish in a dry hole. People are like Porpoise. There are certain things that are absolutely fundamental to our survival. People and Porpoise have two essentials in common: You take away air and water and we’re both sunk. Yet, when I think about it, I don’t know of anyone who has suffocated from lack of oxygen or died from dehydration. Then again, maybe I do.
Our friend Kevin never seemed to fit in anyone’s box. He was short, hyperactive, hyper-verbal, fidgeting all the time, a chain smoker and a dreamer. He’s the kind of guy who likely vibrated as he attempted to sleep in his bed each night. He was a starter-stopper. The sort of person who is always expounding cool projects to accomplish, assembling people to get them done, then backing away without accomplishing much of anything.
Over the years, I witnessed dozens of people become alienated from this young man, including his family, a wife, good friends and a myriad of acquaintances. He couldn’t hold a job for any length of time and became financially unstable. Relationships with others became foreboding for him. He began to perceive people as threatening to him. His ability to maintain focus on anything was impaired. People began to avoid Kevin and he avoided them, becoming somewhat reclusive.
One day Kevin showed up at our home and shared his dream to make a film. He had some experience as a bit part actor in a few films (he was a condom once in a B movie) and worked as a grip on the set of a half dozen film productions. He had written a script and asked me to read it…now! When I was done reading he asked me what I thought. I told him it was actually very good (because it was). He proceeded to ask (beg) me if I would help him raise 1.5 million dollars to produce the film. I told him that we would be unsuccessful in such an attempt, as neither he nor I had ever produced a film. I suggested he cut the budget down to what he could handle through monies he either raised from family, or could obtain through donations (I knew he couldn’t actually work and save this kind of money). I encouraged him to stick with his dream. I told him he needed to do this for him. He needed a win, to fulfill a dream that God had planted on his heart. My parting words to Kevin were, “You can do it.”
Eleven months later there was a knock on our front door at about 9:30PM. It was Kevin. After embracing, he came into our living room and sat down on the couch with his backpack. As he slipped his hand into the backpack, he said, “Bill and Jacki, I wanted you two to be the first to see my film.” He pulled out a videocassette tape that was labeled and had a great photo on the front denoting the title of his film. “I did it!” he said proudly. My wife and I burst into tears, stood and had a long, sloppy, blubbering group hug.
Over the next 35 minutes, we watched the most important film that my wife and I have ever seen. We wept the entire time. Kevin had refreshed our lives with some sorely needed fundamentals for human existence.
During the years leading up to the completion of his film, we witnessed countless attempts by people to mold Kevin into their box by every method known to man…explanations, rituals, interventions, 12 step programs, prescription drugs, therapists, church groups, pastoral counseling and the like. People who claimed to speak for God inflicted the most numerous scars and deepest wounds on Kevin’s soul. He was a guy who would invariably question whether or not there was more to God than what he was being told to “believe this and you’ll be just fine.” Kevin felt as if he had been somehow locked out of God’s love, mercy and grace, an exception. This was a young man who had been told that he was all wet throughout most of his life. The result of all these efforts was a young man who became a dead fish in a dry hole. People had sucked the air and water out of his existence. One author characterizes Kevin’s experience appropriately in the following:
“This is what Jesus saw in the Pharisee’s of His day. They had God in a box of rituals, laws and explanations. There was no more to be unearthed, revealed, or discovered. Spiritual fulfillment that led to no questions, no new mystery and no new promise. Jesus rejects all this not just because of the hypocrisy or because of the lack of love, but because you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven.“[i]
Hope and encouragement are fundamental necessities in the spiritual life. Yet, I have met far too many people walking around selling God boxes full of rituals, laws and explanations that seem to suck the life out of folks, creating casualties like Kevin. The next time you have the urge to open your mouth and set somebody straight that’s all wet, remember, “Words are never mere words — they convey spirit, meaning energy and truth.” [ii] Our words can also suffocate others, sucking the life out of them. Add a little hope and encouragement to what the world has deemed dead fish in a dry hole, and it’s amazing what God can restore to become all He intended it to be. “You can do it.”
NOTES
[i] Galli, Mark Jesus Mean and Wild – The Unexpected Love of An Untamable God, Baker Books, Grand Rapids, MI Copyright © 2006 by Mark Galli P. 109.
[ii] Peterson, Eugene Eat This Book – A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Grand Rapids, MI/ Cambridge U.K. © 2006 by Eugene H. Peterson. P. 50.
