For the love of Margaret

This girl can preach and pray

“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” 1 John 3:16, NIV

Last week at Focus (the youth fellowship that meets at Refuge on Wednesday nights), Sarah shared a message God had laid on her heart from 1 John 3. Sarah is an eighth-grader whose dad pastors Chetek Alliance Church here in town and the Holy Spirit moves mightily in her. While her entire text arose from 1 John 3:11-24, the thing that spoke to me most in her speak is her statement: “real love is sacrifice.” About a month ago, another youth fellowship in our area (AMP, made up of Jesus-loving kids like Sarah and a few others from Focus), sponsored a lock-in at YWAM-Northwoods just outside of town. Lots of kids from school showed up to, among other things, be challenged by a Christian rapper who is a member of the International House of Prayer faith-community in Kansas City. The following Wednesday at Focus the kids who had gone to the lock-in were justifiably jazzed as they shared about all the fun they had had and all of their fellow-classmates who had made professions of faith at that event. Curiously, however, not one of the “newbies” were at group that night (nor, after some discussion, to the best of our collective knowledge at any other youth group in town.) Somehow the thought of establishing a connection with one of these kids didn't naturally come to mind unless it was the assumption that someone else would see to that. Sarah, who had been there that night but is home-schooled, had something to say about this.

She's that kind of girl

After reading 1 John 3:16 (“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers” NIV) she made the statement I quoted her making in the paragraph above: “Love is sacrifice.” She then went on to share from her own life that when we position ourselves to obey his command to love others and we walk across the hall and attempt to establish a connection with someone we normally wouldn't talk to, the love of God will fill our hearts and our love for this person will grow from “a size of a germ to the size of Jupiter.” What a wonderful turn of a phrase.

Sarah is one of those kids who is all in – there is no guile or hidden agenda in her. What you see is what you get. Her love for Jesus she wears on her sleeve (and on her blouse and pants, too.) Troy, one of our elders who helps oversee Focus, likes to challenge us to live “out loud.” Sarah needs no coaching in this department. She assumes that if you profess love for Jesus than you are earnestly seeking to live loudly for him. And when she prays or shares a testimony at group it is good to gently remind her that others would like a chance to share as well. She's that kind of kid. But how right she is. And as she shared her story it made me think again of a story that I've been a part of reaching all the way back to high school days. It's a story I've shared at Focus before. It's the story about Margaret.

I rarely look for new material

Margaret was a girl I went to school with and how I remember it is that she usually sat by herself in the cafeteria in the morning before class began and she always looked forlorn. Now, maybe she wasn't a morning person. Maybe she wasn't fully awake yet but as I would come around the bend from E-Wing and pass through the lunch room buzzing with conversation I would notice her sitting sadly by herself. We must have already known each other from class because I took to stopping at her table and sat across from her and did the only thing I knew to do: I would tell her a joke (and, of course, it was a stupid one; they were the only ones I knew.) While none of my material was gut-slapping funny I usually got her to smile and after that I would feel like my mission was accomplished and I would move on to whatever was my next stop. At least, this is how I remember it.

In any case, after high school, I didn't see nor hear from Margaret again (how did we all stay in touch before the invention of email, the internet and social media?) Five years went by and in the summer of 1985 our fifth year reunion was held. Linda and I had recently become engaged and I was excited to introduce her to my former classmates. I don't remember where it was held but I do remember one thing that happened that night. Sometime during the evening a fairly attractive woman emerged out of the crowd and nearly tackled me with a bear hug (and if memory is correct, Linda was standing right next to me with a very curious look on her face.) For the record, I was just as surprised as she was. “It's me,” she said. “Margaret.” I didn't recognize her. After high school apparently she had joined the army and lost a lot of weight. But the biggest shock I got that night was what she told me next: “You told me a joke every day our senior year and you always made me feel special. Thanks for that.” That was it. I don't remember the rest of our conversation. It probably was the stuff typical of reuions – catching up and filling in. She was in the army and I was heading into my final year of Bible college. After that night, I didn't see her again until my ordination day ten years later.

Yeah...now this is the kind of stuff I tell

By October 1995, I had been serving as the pastor of Chetek Full Gospel (now Refuge) for four years and my pastor felt it was time that I was ordained. So we were back in Madison at Lake City Church (now City Church), the fellowship we were both from. It was a fairly large fellowship, perhaps at the time over a thousand attendees, and the late service was full as it usually was. Following the gathering I was on the main floor of the sanctuary receiving lots of “atta-boys” and congratulations from family, friends and a plethora of well-wishers. And then I noticed someone in the far left balcony waving and pointing toward me and gesturing that I was to stay put and not move. It was a woman flanked by (I assumed) her husband and a few kids and she was leading them to the staircase that led down into the sanctuary. It was Margaret. Since the last time we had met she had gotten married and had a few kids. She also had come to know Jesus and had begun to attend LCC. And this is how she introduced me to her husband: “This guy – he told me a joke every morning before school and always made me feel so special.”

I'm a big fan of social media (specifically, facebook). I think it's one of many ways of staying connected and/or getting reconnected with friends from the different eras of our lives. And I love that little search engine box because ever so once in awhile I'll think of someone from days gone by and type in their name and see if I get any hits. That's how I found Margaret again. I think it was in 2008 (but it could have been after this) when I searched her name and up she came. And so I messaged her wondering how she was and how life had been treating her. According to her in the follow-up message she sent to me, my note had come at just the right time. Between 1995 when I had seen her last and the day my message arrived, life had taken some downturns for her. Her marriage had ended, she had some issues with her kids and she was struggling to hold on to her faith in God. She no longer attended LCC but had returned to the Catholic church she had been raised in and found comfort there. But on the day my message arrived electronically she had been (or so she told me) praying for a sign that God was with her. While I don't recall her relaying she was suicidal my note had apparently come in the nick of time.

Now, I find this funny

When I share that story from time to time I usually say, “All I did was tell a joke.” And it's true (amazing mileage those stupid jokes from the 70s has got!; if only I could remember a single one I'd pass them on to my son, Ed, who is a master of the sharing of the stupid joke himself.) But what I really did was I saw Margaret. We do not fully realize that in high school how much the sun rises and sets on ourselves, how we're feeling, and how we are being perceived by others. We are, at that moment in our life, profoundly self-centered. And it is the nature of that mindset to stay within our trajectory that we follow through a normal high school day – locker, class, the people we hobnob with, eat lunch and practice with. They are in our glide path and unless they careen out of orbit into ours, we don't usually notice those other “satellites” occupying the same space as ourselves. But for some reason I saw Margaret that day, slowed down to notice her and then continued to notice her throughout the remaining months in high school. I'm profoundly grateful that I did.

Yes, this is a little edgy...

Last spring, a girl from our middle school committed suicide. On Friday, she had gone home happy (or so everyone thought) and by Sunday night cyberspace was full of the news: she had shot herself while staying at her grandparents' house. In the emotional week that followed, I shared "the Margaret story" at Focus reminding the kids of their need as disciples of Christ to “see” their fellow classmates and not assume that someone else is checking in with that person. I would say the same goes for these kids from the lock-in recently who professed faith in Christ. It may not be their job to “disciple” them but it is their responsibility to attempt befriending them if only to welcome them into the family. I realize that this is asking a lot but as Sarah reminded us all the other night at Focus, love really is sacrifice. And for most kids still in high school, that sacrifice amounts to eating at another lunch table from time to time or risking a little awkwardness when leaving their normal glide path to attempt to establish relationship. I don't really know any good jokes any more but I do know a guy who can get you some. Who knows how much mileage you may get out of them?

Note: Margaret, as a friend of mine on Facebook. I don't know if you'll see this or not or even care to read it but just in case you do I want you to know that the story I told within this post are the events as I remember them. I have not consciously tried to embellish them. However, memory being subjective and fickle as it is, you may recall certain events differently. I want you to know that if you see the need you are free to send me corrections to set the record straight. Either way I think you and I are in agreement that like Sarah says referencing the love of Christ Jesus, “real love is sacrifice.” 

Postscript late Monday night: Margaret not only saw this post but read it and was good enough to send some comments my way. I'll include one I think would be appropriate to share publicly:
 "As I read the story again. I could have been anyone. Yes, you did stop by my table every morning. You have affected my life by just doing that small thing like telling a joke to lift a spirit. That one little thing is like the old saying of a ripple on the water. You are one of my ripples, and I love you for that. 

Once again, thank you again for kind words and if needed, keep using my story, hopefully it will encourage another to just stop by someones table in the morning to tell a joke. This weekend the 'family' will be getting together. I am going to print this story. Not as 'my' story of the low parts in my life, but to show others that it really is the least thing you can do by offering a joke or something of yourself. You just never know what the other person is doing or thinking and may just need you."