Wednesday, June 1, 2022
Memorial of Saint Justin, Martyr
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Watching Marc work at Bunny’s
I do not ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the Evil One. They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. Consecrate them in the truth.
Sitting at Bunny’s with Andi and Aki, we watched Marc do his splendid thing as bartender, knowing everyone’s name, making drinks faster than our eyes could follow his hands, carrying them inside and outside, spinning conversation all the while with almost everyone who came in, and cleaning up whenever he had a second. Marc was in his element. Now and then we just couldn’t help it – we applauded him.
And in time we met Ashlyn from Shawneetown, who turned out to be a big Marc fan too. She’s studying occupational therapy, hoping to work with veterans or disabled kids. Her home town doesn’t quite hold a thousand people. Shawneetown was moved from the banks of the Wabash River decades ago, and the original location has flooded over and over since.
In the last few years her mother has moved to a tiny desert town an hour outside Las Vegas, another “Shawneetown” on the other side of the country. On one of the three screens above the bar guys were playing poker in Florida. Seven slot machines lined the outside wall, near the door. Outside eight tables of rowdy, happy people were making lots of noise.
As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world. And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.
When we arrived at Bunny’s it was slow slow slow. Marc was the only serving person left, along with the short order chef in back. No reason to keep extra wait staff around, they were happy to leave.
But the people started coming, and they kept on coming. Bunny’s keeps its prices low, and their patrons appreciated that with lots of orders. At one point Marc had to catch up with charging for the drinks he had poured. I could almost see his brain sifting through the last few minutes, recapturing one detail after another.
Is this the world? Are we watching Marc carry the grace and love he has received from Jesus to the folks around him?
Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are one. When I was with them I protected them in your name, and I guarded them, and none of them was lost except the son of destruction.
Andi and Aki watched with me, and none of us doubted for a moment that the customers in Bunny’s were blessed to be served by Marc. Maybe that’s a little nepotistic, or maybe it’s not. His way of connecting with them was personal, efficient, friendly and it went far beyond “business.” Sometimes he looked into their eyes. Often he asked about their troubles. And he wasted no time sharing his opinions – he just listened.
You know well that these very hands (Paul’s hands) have served my needs and my companions’. In every way I have shown that by hard work of that sort we must help the weak, and keep in mind the words of the Lord Jesus who himself said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” When he had finished speaking he knelt down and prayed with them all.
Often during Marc’s life we have hoped and prayed that he would become a spiritual servant, a giver of all good things, sharing his own miracles and gifts from God with others. He has done this in all kinds of ways in his almost forty years, and now he is doing it several nights a week at Bunny’s, in Urbana.
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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