“Hi” I smiled at the man who was sitting on the bench outside of the park where my group had decided we wanted to evangelize for the night. He had been smiling at me as we were walking toward the gate to the park, so I decided to hand him one of the tracks that explain the gospel in Romanian. As I handed it to him he said something that I didn’t understand.
I turned to my friend (who is only 14) to translate for me and she didn’t understand him either. Apparently what sounded like mumbling to me wasn’t just me not being able to speak Romanian, but him actually mumbling. So, I told him we were going to walk around the park and started to walk away.
I guess he saw this as an invitation, or even possibly as us asking for a tour of the park. He started limping his way to toward the park and we followed. My friends and I were definitely uncomfortable, especially considering the way other people stared and avoided him.
Despite being uncomfortable, I didn’t necessarily feel unsafe. So I decided to keep following him. My thought was that if this man needs someone to simply walk with him to know that he’s loved then there isn’t any harm in walking with him.
Anytime we got a little too far behind the man he would exclaim something and wait for us while using his arms to gesture us along. As we were walking he would sometimes point at things in the park and laugh. He also would say “da” every so often and laugh like it was the funniest joke he’s ever heard.
While the man was finding joy in this simple walk, my friends and I were talking about what we should do. We couldn’t try and evangelize to anyone else because everyone in the park acted like they were scared of him. We thought about calling someone. We thought about trying to talk to the police officers who are sometimes in the park, but didn’t see anyone while we were walking.
We made it to the lake in the park and sat down on a bench thinking maybe he would keep walking. He didn’t. He stood in front of us and waited for us to be ready to keep walking. He stood there saying things to us that we couldn’t understand.
Finally we decided to go toward the boats that you can take onto the lake for free. We figured if he tried to get in the boat with us we would ask the man working to help us. As we walked toward the boats the man tried to get us to go a different direction. After trying to tell him no a bunch of times I finally just said “la revedere” meaning “goodbye.” He responded with a smile and said goodbye and walked away.
As I think about this time with the man in the park, I think about the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. People avoided her because she was considered unclean. I’m sure people looked at her with disgust, knowing that if they touched her they would be considered unclean as well. She was so desperate for healing that she crawled on the floor through the crowd just to touch the hem of Jesus’ garment.
Jesus felt the power leave him as this woman was healed. He insisted on finding her in the crowd so he could lift her face and say to her “Daughter, your faith has healed you.” God wasn’t afraid of her uncleanness or her “disease.” He wasn’t uncomfortable by the things that made her an outcast in the society. Jesus called her daughter and embraced her.
God knows the name of the man we walked with. He wouldn’t have been uncomfortable by the awkward way other people in the park were looking at him. In fact, I fully believe Jesus would have rebuked the people for rejecting this man based on an assumed disability. He probably would have rebuked me for my heart posture of figuring out how to get out of walking with this man for too long…
Lord, give me eyes to see people the way you see them. Give me a heart that doesn’t shy away from the uncomfortable, but steps into loving people as you love them.
Blessings,
Kaci
