Jeff Delp's Blog
I have been saved / Apr 2, 12:34 PM
Riding home on the 42 from downtown today, I had an unexpected experience. Now, I have seen plenty of street preachers in my time in downtown Atlanta, there is usually one on every corner of Five Points MARTA station (the main station downtown). But this particular experience was new for me.
A young man, about the same age as most of our MY participants, entered the bus and asked the driver if he could speak to the bus. At that moment, I knew that I was in for a treat!! The young man started out with some nice pleasantries, but then quickly moved on to what it was obvious he was there for, he wanted to pray for the bus. He asked everyone to bow their heads and pray with him, and to my surprise, most people did. He went on to pray for the trip home, to keep the bus safe, to enjoy the rest of the day, then he asked people to pray with him if they wanted to be saved. He lead people on the bus in a prayer asking for forgiveness of sins and asking Jesus into their heart. And then he was done, and he left the bus to go talk with some folks on the sidewalk waiting for another bus. Just that fast, I was saved. The problem is, I was already saved, and so were a majority of people on that bus if statistics are true.
The are many different things that I would love to unpack about this experience today. Issues of race, economics, theology, etc… all jump into my head. Lots of assumptions were made by this young man about the people on the bus, including me. I would love to know some of his motivations. But what sticks out in my head is here is someone out doing something about what he believes in. Even though I adamantly oppose the methodology behind his actions, I have to respect the man for putting himself out there for what he believes in. That is more than most of us can lay claim to.
The question for me after the experience today isn’t how do we prevent this young man, and all of the others like him, from being the face and voice of the Christian movement. But rather, how do we as Christians who love justice, who seek racial reconciliation, who desire economic justice, who desire community get our voices heard by the masses. It has been my experience that far too many non-believers (including the main stream media) associate Christianity with the man on the bus, and not with those of us that seek to take Jesus’ commandments seriously. And that is not the fault of the man on the bus, that blame should be placed solely on us for not getting the message out.
I don’t think that publicly speaking on a MARTA bus is the avenue to convey the message about justice, equality, racial reconciliation, and community. But I do think that just riding the bus opens up the dialog to begin the conversation with people that we have relationships with (as I did when I ran into someone I knew from the Open Door community on the train prior to this encounter). In Atlanta at least, it shows that we are in solidarity with those who must ride MARTA and who have been marginalized by where the live or the color of their skin.
So, I was thankful for the experience today. Not because I was saved, but because it encouraged me to take spreading the message of the gospel more seriously, albeit in a different form. I hope you do as well.
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Good word.
I know this is a bit off of your topic, but I do think that for those of us who focus on the justice, reconciliation, etc. aspects of the gospel through less… shall we say “blatant” (confrontory?) avenues, sometimes it’s actually a good reminder and provocation when we encounter someone who chooses to use a method like entering a bus and praying for the riders and their salvation.
(sorry, I don’t feel like I said that very eloquently)
By Andrea in Chicago / Apr 3, 07:50 PM / #