Friday, October 18, 2013

Stronger than the World

On my way home recently, I decided to stop at my favorite bagel shop. It's a far walk from the metro, but I decided that I would get a bagel for lunch, buy a bag of bagels to share, and then take the bus home.

I ate lunch there, bought a half dozen bagels, and waited for the bus. All seemed to be going according to plan. But just before my stop, a whole crowd of people got onto the bus. When my stop came, they hadn't yet had a chance to move to the back. So I was faced with a choice: assume that the crowds would part for me, or take the back exit.

What I should have done: take the back exit. What I did: assume that the crowds would part for me.

They didn't. And as I bumped into a very apologetic gentleman, the bag of bagels broke. My precious bagels fell to the ground, as I'm sure my jaw did.

I picked them up hastily, and sadly exited the bus, feeling defeated by the world and my own clumsiness.

Now I play the ten second rule (sometimes the thirty second rule), but not with bus floors. I had to toss them in the trash. If you've ever wondered what a broken promise looks like, I'd say it looks like fresh bagels in a trash can.

If you're laughing, I suspect that it's probably because you know what fresh bagels in a trash can feels like. You know what being defeated by the world and your own clumsiness feels like.

So where is God in those little moments of frustration, in the fresh bagels that fall to the floor, in the alarm clock that doesn't go off, in the computer that freezes, or in the countless other little moments that make us sigh?

I think there are a lot of potential answers to that question, once we give ourselves the freedom to ask it. We don't usually allow ourselves to ask it because it seems... petty. Small. And maybe it is. But once we admit that we are small and our questions are small, we can be free enough to ask them honestly.

I suspect that maybe God is in the realization of our call to solidarity -- in that sobering realization that there are too many who go hungry in the world, and that for many people in the world, a story about wasted food isn't very funny.

These moments always humble us because they remind us that we aren't the center of the universe, that the world doesn't turn on our principles or wishes. There are principles like gravity and the free will of other people that operate completely independent of our plans. Maybe God is in that awareness of our smallness, which allows us to slowly become aware of his complete "Other-ness," and our mission to love and serve each other in solidarity, with that love that is "stronger than the world" and all of its frustrations.

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