Taking the Time to Make a Difference

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The deli counter seemed to be in clean-up mode when I walked up. I asked the woman behind the counter if she was still making sandwiches. I didn’t know what to expect for an answer. This deli counter is in a grocery store where I vividly remember another question I had asked many months ago, and the answer I had received. That earlier encounter involved my purchase of three small items. I like to use paper bags from the grocery store to recycle newspapers at home, so as the cashier finished totalling up my purchases, I thanked her and spoke to the young man bagging my items. I asked him to put my things into a paper bag. He looked at me and said, “You only got three items.” He dropped my stuff into a plastic bag and shoved it towards me. I stayed away from that store for quite a while, but it is conveniently located, and I have returned occasionally. On my recent late evening stop for a sandwich, I did not know what to expect. The deli counter worker smiled when I asked if she was still making sandwiches. She said “No, but I’ll fix one for you.”

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I am reluctant to call to mind the story of the Good Samaritan. After all, how many times do we encounter somebody beaten and robbed by the side of the road? But it may be a lot more frequent to experience a request from someone who interrupts our ordinary routine.

• A child’s illness interferes with the work I intended to do today.
• There is a knock on the door during meal time. The child of a neighbor is selling a school fund raising item.
• There is a public service announcement on radio during time I had hoped to be distracted from the cares and stresses of daily life – and someone is making a request for holiday meal assistance.
• There is a troubling news report filling a back page space in the local newspaper about world hunger, pointing out that one in six of our world’s population is hungry, and that 25,000 people in the world die each day from starvation. According to my reading of the Gospels, our typical reaction to unexpected interruptions is far different than the reaction of Jesus.
• A troubled parent asks for – and receives – healing for a child.
• The disciples who want to send the children away are told that a child should be welcome.
• Friends of a sick man poke a hole in the roof and interrupt Jesus while he is trying to teach people about the Kingdom of God.
• A parable teaches us to keep knocking on a neighbor’s door to ask for what we want, even if it is at night and inconvenient.
• The disciples know they can’t afford to buy enough food for thousands of hungry people, but Jesus tells them to give them what they have and share it with everybody.

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Is it any different today? The child of an immigrant family faces illness without insurance. It is a good thing we have rules about such situations, isn’t it? People keep knocking at the door. They want something from us. Don’t they know our doors are closed? Lord, we don’t have enough money to feed a billion people. I hope you don’t expect us to share what we have. You certainly wouldn’t expect us to try to change long-established rules of importing and exporting and how we do foreign aid. Would you?

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Take the time today to reflect on the interruptions in your life, and on how Jesus responded. Consider the ways you might respond to such interruptions, as a parent, as a parishioner, as a citizen, as a member of the family of God. Your response will make a difference.

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