Leap Over


Dear Eugene,

Last night I received an email that I've been praying for, hoping for, but also dreading its arrival.  You know how it is, a Jesus prayer: pray like you really mean it, run for your life when it's actually answered.

I volunteer at the neighborhood house of my local community as a literacy tutor, mentoring people with various levels of illiteracy.  A while ago I asked the program director to send a second tutee my way.  I pressed Send and hoped the email would go to her spam box.  And for a couple of months that little anti-Jesus prayer seemed to have been answered instead of the one before that.

Then last night, a reply, giving me what I asked for.

 Well, all over again...

Trying my best to connect with a complete stranger...hard work, not necessary, different lifestyle, different worldview, too intimate for comfort, not a very good use of my time and energy...there must be something less painful out there, touch-and-go projects for me to be an easy messiah...what if this person doesn't like me, hate how I talk, how I smell, how I breathe, how I explain things?  This little smart aleck tongue can be too smart for Alex to do any good.  No false modesty here; every time I do something like this I have a feeling I am gonna mess it up big time.  Language.  Who am I to speak about this language when the language I speak often doesn't work to bridge across?  Get Off Bed, three words I spoke to my son this morning.  None of them worked. The implied subject in my imperative sentence doesn't care to be implicated.  Who am I to speak a word about speaking?

Surprise surprise, Eugene.  A surprise that is not a surprise.  I became a literacy tutor because of you...and Donald Trump.  The You part is obvious: you preached your one sermon and I responded, if not in ten-thousand ways, if not always in good faith, if only in making feeble attempts, like this one.  And...yes, Trump.  I sent in my application to become a tutor on the very night he got elected.  The world is full of bad news, I said, and before anything else what I can do now is to declare the Good News.  Even to just one person.  Even painstakingly.  Even to no apparent big effect.  Don't think twice; it's alright.  I've been praying about the volunteer position for weeks before because you shepherded me to go there; then that night I was shown a wall to leap over.  On my first day of training I put on the first page of my big training binder: Thank you Trump.

I don't think it was a coincidence that I received the email about my second tutee last night.  Thank you for humoring me, pastor Pete.  I don't know this person but Jesus knows him/her well.

Yours, Alex

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