It's Pronounced Way-Co...not Wacko.

Written March 3, 2008
I had a great weekend.I went to Waco, Texas… which was described to me as the armpit of Texas, and had a crazy fun time.

First I went to a Baylor basketball game, which was out of control. Baylor students and alumni are slightly obsessed with their school and traditions. I thought I was going to get bear clawed, but don’t worry I made it out alive, and Baylor won the game so all were happy at the end of the afternoon… well except for the Missouri fans, but who counts them?

Then Kim (my good friend from here in Dallas that is a Baylor alum) took me around Baylor’s beautiful campus. Everything really is bigger in Texas. The science building alone was like 3 times bigger than Demoss (the main building at LU). There are a bunch of different statues and stuff all over campus, so Kim and I had fun walking around, taking pictures and being goofy.

That night we scored tickets to “Sing,” which is this giant music thing that the sororities and fraternities put on each spring. It was out of control. You could probably feed a small country with the amount of money that went into the night. Each group performs this 8 minute musical act. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen 150+ sorority girls singing and dancing on stage like their lives depended on it. It’s a competition, and holy cow these people were serious. My favorites were the fraternity acts. Some of them were really good and really creative, plus it’s just funny to see boys singing and dancing.

Then on Sunday morning we went to church. Now my whole reason for going to Waco was to hear Shane Claiborne preach at a church there in town, all the other stuff was just an added bonus.

Shane Claiborne is the author of, “Irresistible Revolution,” which I’ve mentioned before in this silly blog. I looooooove that stinkin book and have given it to a lot of people as gifts, and recommended it to countless others. He’s amazing and his lifestyle is one that I admire and wish I had the courage to choose for myself.

www.irresistiblerevolution.org
Check them out.

Anyway… Shane preached at “Church Under the Bridge.” www.churchunderthebridge.org which is a church that started in the early 90s in a response to the needs of the homeless in Waco. The church meets under a bridge with the traffic of I-35 roaring by every week. This particular week there were at least 300 people there. A lot of the people were homeless or from lower incomes, there were a lot of college-aged students who were there to hear Shane or because they were curious about the church, but there were also normal everyday believers who have chosen to abandon churches that exclude different races or those living outside of their economic status. It was an incredible picture of how I have envision the Church is intended to look. No one was excluded or looked down upon. I saw a woman wearing pearls and nice clothes, standing next to a woman who wore clothes with holes, and had disheveled hair… both worshipping the same God with everything they had. It was a place where one could stand tall, without shame. It was beautiful.

The worship was great and heartfelt. One huge problem in the homeless community are various mental health illnesses, without the means to be properly treated. There were a couple men that attended this church, that could be placed in this category. I think about churches that I’ve attended that have “buddies” to sit with mentally disabled church members to keep them calm or quiet during this service. At the church under the bridge, these individuals were loved for who they are and allowed to be themselves. Before Shane got up to speak, the pastor introduced one of the men, and he sang the sweetest, childlike version of Jesus Loves Me that I’ve ever heard. What a humbling moment, a person that society so often neglects and regards as unimportant, reminded me that Jesus loved him and died for him too. He sang that song with such joy, and confidence that he really knew that Jesus does indeed love him.

Shane’s sermon began by talking about how Jesus was counter culture in the way that He ministered to those around Him. Jesus said and did strange things. He used spit and mud to make a blind man see. He raised men from the dead, and told people to leave their loved ones and to pick up their crosses and follow Him. Shane challenged us to look at the way Christ lived and compare it to how Christians are viewed today.

He brought up a study that Barna did that asked people how they view Christians today. The top 3 things were that 1) Christians are anti-gay 2) Christians judgmental and 3) Christians are hypocrites.

It would appear that we’re going through a bit of an image crisis. Jesus didn’t come for the healthy but the sick (Mark 2:17). He didn’t come for the people who have it all together but the broken, yet that is the opposite of the picture we’re portraying today.

How appropriate for the environment I found myself in, all the while feeling more and more convicted of the brokenness existing in my own heart and life.

Shane told a story of a time when he was propositioned by a prostitute on the way to the store. He kindly turned her down, went on to the store to buy bread, and returned home. When he got home, he and his friend noticed the bread he had bought had a tear in the bag and all the bread was stale. So he and his friend set off back to the store, Shane knowing full well he’d have to pass that same woman. On their way home from their second trip to the store, they noticed the woman in an alley huddled in the corner of some buildings. They stopped, knelt beside her and began talking to her. They wanted to hear her story.

They invited this woman, a prostitute, back to their home and told her it was a safe place where she could get warm and eat a good meal. When she stepped in the door she stopped and started to cry, asking them if they were Christians. They said yes, that they loved Jesus. She told them that she could tell because of the “shine” they had about them. Then she told them that she too used to love Jesus, but that this world was dark and cold, and somewhere along the road, she had lost her shine.

She left that afternoon, and they didn’t expect to see her again.

Months later there was a knock at their door and when Shane opened it, there she stood proclaiming she’d gotten her shine back. God is a god of love and restoration, regardless of how far you think you’ve strayed from him.

How can we begin to see people with new eyes? How do we stop looking at people, but instead through them to see the image of Christ?

One of Shane’s friends once told him that, “Jesus never talked to a prostitute… because he never
saw a prostitute.” When we’re able to see how much God loves us exactly how we are, we’re able to better love others around us.

“None of us can fully recover until we fix the society that caused our brokenness to begin with.”

Shane has a new book out called, “Jesus for President” and I can’t wait to read it. So in light of this new book, and the upcoming elections, he brought up some of the key issues. He talked about healthcare, and about a 6 year old girl he knew that died of an asthma attack, while waiting 6 hours in one of the free clinics near where she lived. Children need health care. Shane challenged us with the thought that we can wait on the government to provide healthcare for those who need it, or we can believe in a church that provides. We are called to bear each other’s burdens, and this Good News we bring should be good news to the poor too.

“If you want to know what we believe, then watch how we live.” Could I ever claim that phrase for myself? Is that true for my own life? Ashamedly, not so much.

One of the chapters in Shane’s new book is called, “Amish for Homeland Security.” He talks about the tragedy that happened in the Amish community last year when a gunman entered one of their little schools and killed the children that were students there. Where many communities would react in outrage and anger toward the killer (who committed suicide in the school house) and his family, the Amish actually showered love and mercy on this man’s family. They met with his family and expressed their grief and sorrow for the loss his family was experiencing. They prayed for this murderer and for peace for his family.

“In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.” Mother Teresa

We are called to “shine” God’s love to a world starving for His grace.

What will it take to become a generation of Christians not know by the labels of “anti-gay,” “judgmental,” and “hypocritical” but instead known by our love?

What would it take to begin to live our lives out for other people? The same selfless, sacrificial love that Christ shows us everyday. To be one with Him.

Jesus prayed, “Let your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” With love, it’s possible.


So after Shane finished his sermon, and I stood in line to receive communion, my mouth filled with the grimy dust from the interstate, I wondered what it would look like if the Kingdom really did come on earth as it is in heaven. I smiled, and realized that it would probably look something like the church I was visiting that morning. I stepped up to the table where a man, who may have been homeless, handed me my bread, and I looked down to my paper cup filled with grape juice and dirt from the wind, and I was thankful.

It was humbling experience, one that I will never forget.


AND, to top it all off, I got to go up and meet Shane and finally tell him how much his book has meant to me and inspired me. He was a very nice American…and didn’t make me feel lame for being a lame fan of his.

AND THEN later that afternoon while I was eating lunch, I looked up to see the entire David Crowder Band leaving the restaurant. How exciting. I resisted the urge to run after them and get a picture… because I’d feel like a lame, Waco tourist… but know that I wanted to. J

It was a great weekend.

"We try and make the world safe, knowing that world will never be safe as long as millions live in poverty so a few can live as they wish." Shane Claiborne