Muddy Shoes

[dave c]

A HEALING SHELTER MINISTRIES #119a Written 10OCT07 http://groups.msn.com/AHealingShelter/welcome.msnw

Muddy Shoes

by dave c

Some years back I attended a church where a group of men took turns cleaning the building on Saturday in preparation for Sunday’s service. My name having risen to the top of the schedule, I was vacuuming the sanctuary one evening (with an even mixture of real joy in Christ and fleshly pride in my humility) when I discovered an area in the back rows where someone had been sitting who must have had really, really muddy shoes. My back immediately arched with sanctimonious aggravation that this kid, this teenager, whoever he was (and I had my theories), possessed so little consideration for Jesus (and mostly me) that he didn’t at least scrape the worst of the dirt from his shoes before entering “God’s house”. While I struggled to get dried mud out of the carpet, our pastor walked in only to be greeted by my grumbling. This wonderful man of God just smiled and said, “I’ve learned to be thankful for the feet that made the mess”. I was immediately pierced to the heart.

"I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth (Jn 16:12&13; NIV). Amen. That pastor said so much with so few words. I have volumes of photo albums and shelf after shelf of memory’s scrapbooks that remind me of people and places and circumstances and events that bring a smile to the forefront of this aging face...and sometimes a touch of sorrow to a heart that longs for lost family and friends. But there are also the back rows of my existence where various “someones” (I remember all their names and faces) have left tracks of mud encrusted in the fiber of my life. Ah, me—the bitterness, the hurt, and the ire that I hash and rehash over offenses real and imagined as I look, and look again, at the mess they left behind on their way to somewhere else. Slowly, I’m learning to be “thankful for the feet that made the mess.”

You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives (Ge 50:10; NIV). During the first year after we met, while intimating some of the worst that life had brought her, my wife said to me, “I like me, and if it took some of these things happening to help make me who I am—then I shouldn’t complain about even them.” Her comment reflects much wisdom...in fact they are wiser words than often spoken by doctors, attorneys, pastors, counselors, professors, and philosophers. Her statement says that just learning to cope is not enough. Her words suggest that even forgiveness is insufficient. Like the pastor from the opening paragraph, and like Joseph in Egypt more than three and a half millennia ago, my wife was saying that she needs to “learn to be thankful for the feet that made the mess”.

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you (Ro 12:3; NIV). I claim no innocence in the wearing of dirty shoes. In “The War To Do Unto Others Before They Do Unto You” I can claim the dubious honor of having ‘given better than I got’. There is no doubt that I have tramped more mud through the lives of others than they have through mine. If you are one of those people, or you know of someone whom I mistreated, I truly ask forgiveness. I pray that you know Jesus personally as your Lord and Savior and that you have allowed the Holy Spirit to guide you past the anger, the pain, and the harm for which I have been/am responsible. At the very least, I pray that you are willing to be willing to forgive—for your own sake.

When [Jesus] had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. "Do you understand what I have done for you?" he asked them. "You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you (Jn 13, 12-15: NIV). Jesus loves me in spite of my muddy shoes. He loves you, too, and He has told us to love one another so that we might help each other clean up the inevitable messes we make as life happens. We need to forgive one another, not just learn to “deal with it”. And more than that...we need to begin to thank God for each other in all circumstances and upon all occasions. Even the messy ones.

[Shellie]

Dave,

I've missed you.

[dave c]

You mean you threw something at me...I wasn't there...so you missed? Thank you, we've been really busy and we're going through a number of changes. I'm hoping that God will have me writing again on a regular basis. I pray Jesus blesses you in ways that are beyond the dreams of your heart.

your brother in Christ,
dave c