Let me tell you a brief story. . . last night Jennifer and I were sitting together watching a show on Netflix. JonMark was down in his room struggling with some chemistry homework that seemed far to advanced for me to understand. Occasionally he would “pop" back upstairs to get a drink or a snack. The strain on his face regarding the material that he was reading was obvious to us. We knew that he was working hard—it was a regular evening for us.
The wind was whipping in through our cracked front window. The smell of autumn was with us.
Then, in hindsight, we heard a crash. At the time neither Jennifer nor I registered that something happened; but it did. We would both say after this story, that we thought that we heard something but we didn’t think to say something at the time. So the evening continued at the same pace. . . It was almost time to pick up Emma from work.
A little while later, just after 8pm, the dogs needed to go out. As I turned to head toward the front door, I saw a car “parked” in the middle of Plains Church Road. “That’s odd,” I though. The car's light were shining onto something that I couldn’t see clearly. And so I walked toward the window to investigate.
“We have a problem,” I said to Jennifer as I switched on the flood light in the front yard. Sure enough we did. A tree branch came off a tree across the road from us and was laying across most of Plains Church Road. Its yellow leaves were brightly shining because of the car’s lights. The people in the car were attempting to move the massive limb just enough so that they could get through.
But they weren’t being successful. As I walked toward them, with my eyes focusing more and more on the now quite large tree branch, they began to retreat to their car to speed away. It appeared that they worried that if they stayed until I got there 1 of 2 things would happen:
1- I would assume the were at fault for a 20 ft tree limb falling and make them clean it up while I watched with my arms crossed threatening to call the police if they didn't do it.
OR
2- I would ask them to help because it was such a large tree branch.
Neither seemed like their preferred option (and let me say I don’t know what was happening in their lives. So I offer no specific judgement about them not staying to help). They did not stay and as I said ‘have a good night,’ they accelerated quickly away from the scene. I sighed, and yelled to Jennifer who was on the porch now to get the truck. JonMark was already walking my way pulling his chainsaw into life. I thought, “seriously Lord, more tree work!”
But it was time and so it had to be done.
Jennifer pointed the truck toward the tree for light and switched on the high beams. She then took her place in the road to direct traffic away from us while JonMark and I got to work cutting and carrying the branches away. Then an Acura pulled up and switched on his high beams. We continued to work. We saw him, but didn’t think anything more than, ‘let’s just get this done.'
He talked with Jennifer for a few moments. Before emerging from the suv to help us. He never said a word as he came close. He just smiled and helped us carry and pull the branches off the road. When we were done we thanked him, he smiled in affirmation, and we all went back to our lives. The whole thing took less than 5 minutes to do.
As I walked back into the house, I wondered, which person in this story am I normally?
The busy-body who could not stay to help (I preached about that mindset this past weekend)? Am I worker who does the work because it must be done, but sighs while I do it? Or am I the person who comes alongside of another person who seems to be struggling with the task, and quietly helps because God helped me once?
You may not have to remove a tree branch today such as we did last night, but you do have the opportunity to help, to be present, to work with, someone else who needs you. I wonder how you might respond when this moment comes into your life?
Blessings
Rev. Derek
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