Broken Dishes and BarackWritten by Roger Wright
Broken Dishes and Voice of GodBarack Obama, alone, leaned against wall in kitchen corridor underneath Hotel Allegro in Chicago and looked at his watch. Next to him, a bus cart jammed with dirty breakfast dishes waiting to be washed. In dining room above, his introduction was winding down, and in 90 seconds, he'd get a running start for stairs and go bounding up two at a time to spring into good sized room for one last stop on this campaign. As Barack Obama stood alone; smoke filled, back room, cigar chomping, nod and a wink echoes of generations of Chicago politicians, their chuckling, knowing spirits too rooted in downtown loop to ever leave, despite candidates that came and went, paused for one eternal moment and all took a look. Later that night, all these generations of dark and shaded political men knew, Barack Obama would be up in front of a room 10 times size of one in Allegro. He would be thanking everyone. And owing no one. So they paused for one quick glance. Santiago Cruz, 52 years old and smiling like Columbian sunshine even when he thought himself alone, carrying a grey, plastic tub of dirty coffee cups and saucers, didn't notice Barack Obama on other side of bus cart of dishes. Swinging his grey tub up over his head to plunk it down on top of cart, Santiago looked to his right and saw quiet Obama smiling. In space of a second, Santiago wiped his hands on his pants and took Obama's outstretched hand. And as Barack leaned in towards man to shake, he bumped his shoulder hard into cart, spilling all he dishes stacked on top on to floor, shattering in a million pieces and at same time sending a jarring shooting pain all through Obama's shoulder, a pain so sharp he winced and bowed his head. And as he winced in pain without one real clear thought at all, Obama instinctively got to his knees to begin picking up shattered dishes. Santiago Cruz, still stunned by crash, stood for a moment and looked down at man on his knees picking up dishes. Joining him then on floor to do same, Santiago heard applause from dining room upstairs and beep of other man's cell phone going off at very same time. Santiago Cruz and Barack Obama, both kneeling on floor, their faces a foot apart, looked straight at each other and another kind of recognition registered on Santiago's face. Where he had been smiling before, where Santiago ALWAYS smiled, smile took on a deeper tone. Something changed in that smile---and there was a tone of sadness in that smile, then hope flickered for just a moment and his eyes lit up to a new brightness and he said "OBAMA! OBAMA OBAMA!"
| | Thoughts on the Road to EmmausWritten by Staci Stallings
“. . . their eyes were opened, and they recognized him . . .” –Luke 24:31Two friends—people who had known Jesus, who had walked with Him, talked with Him, and eaten meals with Him every day for three years didn’t recognize Him even on a long walk down a dusty road. Have you ever wondered about that? I have. How could that possibly be? The reality is: disciples were looking at a man who happened to be traveling along same road they were. They did not see Jesus because they did not expect to see Jesus. How many times on our walks through life do we not see Jesus? How many times do we talk with a co-worker or a parent or a child or a friend or even someone we have never met before and fail to recognize that this person holds a precious piece of Our Lord and Savior within them? And because we don’t recognize Jesus in them, we treat them not as we would treat Jesus, but as just our friend, or just our co-worker, or just our child. It must make Jesus terribly sad that for all our flowery words and pious presumptions, we still do not recognize Him in each other. Moreover, consider this: Is it possible that in religious settings, we look at one another, and instead of seeing Jesus, we see only other person’s religion, their label? And because we don’t see Jesus, we say, "You are so obviously not spiritual—look, you stand when we are kneeling, or you use crucifixes instead of picturing risen Lord, or you pray to statues and icons instead of to living God, or you don’t have our label, and so, obviously God is not going to let you into His kingdom." Thus, we spend so much time questioning each other's commitment to Jesus and so much time fighting over man-made rules and laws that we forget about those people who are lost and hurting. We forget to do God's real work—ministering to those who are hungry for His word and His truths to come into their lives. Instead, having been seduced by Satan to believe that God's kingdom is some kind of exclusive club, we spend our time fighting with each other about who is going to get in and completely fail to see that world is going to hell around us.
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