some thoughts in a coffee shop

i'm sitting in java and jazz right now...it's become a second home for me as of late.

caitlin is working on her powerpoint and rachel and danielle on a massive persuasion project. i am avoiding outlines.


there's a couple sitting off to my right and they just can't stop looking into one another's eyes and touching each other's faces. they don't see anyone else. and i can't decide who's stranger...this couple so into one another or me who can't imagine being that wrapped up in one person. maybe someday.

the other night we randomly met a guy in here who had just moved to the area and we gave him the names of our churches. a couple of women have been sitting at a table near me and just talking for the past hour and a half. and as i've asked rachel, "what would it feel like to go to coffee shops without homework?" i can't picture such a state.


i think that's why i like java and jazz. i realize that there really is life beyond college. i see the little kids trail their parents into the store and run around on the newhall coffee company logo on the floor. i watch a small child cautiously tiptoe around the edge of the counter before her dad swoops her back to safety. i see the rushed housewives and the business men looking at their watches and the kids who sit outside and smoke and the juniorhighers out on "dates" and the screenwriters trying to make it big and the couples falling in love or trying to pick up the pieces of a relationship...and i see again that the world is so much bigger than me. and i am amazed at my God who is orchestrating it all.

the barristas here have become friendly faces. rachel now has a usual. someone put up a poem on the bulletin board in the bathroom and rachel and i talk about posting some of our own attempts at poetry. and it's funny how a coffee shop can begin to feel a little like home. it's the people i'm sure. one of my friends finally admitted that she was in love and that's how she described it...feeling at home with him, no matter how far away home really was. that sounds lovely to me.


i'm an expert people watcher. i wonder if you can put that on a resume? i love collecting bits and pieces of people's lives from what they do and say and then piecing together an entire life from that information and my overactive imagination. today i was waiting to pick up kids from bridgeport elementary school and i made up an entire life story for the man sitting on the wall next to me. and i saw dr. wong. that doesn't have anything to do with anything, but i think this is rather a stream-of-consciousness update.

i think maybe why i couldn't imagine being like that couple is that i people-watch even when i'm with those i love most. maybe i even do it more with them.

i haven't eaten all day. today was the day of fasting and prayer for newhall. but i'm not sure this fast has had its intended effect in me. i've been praying for newhall all day, but not in lieu of eating. i've just been praying for newhall whenever i would normally pray for other things...when i'm driving or walking or that little chunk of time between lunch and work. i spent my lunch hour in the caf, just not eating but selling spring party tickets instead. and i spent my dinner time at work. i think i might go get some food...is that wrong? i just feel really tired and i know it's lack of calories. i still have quite a night ahead of me...and a seven o'clock meeting tomorrow morning. i need to figure out how to really fast and not simply skip meals. i do that anyway, just out of sheer busyness.

today i looked at the sky. it's always a better day when i remember to do that. some days i forget and i walk along watching my feet and i forget all the vast grandeur above me. i remembered today and as i walked out of my new testament class i just tipped my head back, looked at the vast blue, and breathed deeply. and at those moments, God sends calm to my heart. it sounds mystical when i type it out, but i promise that it's not charismatic in any non-biblical way. it's just me remembering where i fit in this world and breathing out of sheer dependence on God. i call it worship breathing in my head. sometimes i just take my breath for granted, but i can't when i look at the sky.


i looked at the sky last night too. i was on a beach in la and the wind was blowing as hard as it could and my feet were soaking wet from foolishly standing too close to the waves. i was wrapped in a sleeping bag that smelled like my childhood and the moon was directly overhead. and i just leaned back and breathed.

Skid Row is never the same two weeks in a row.

This last Friday night I met a man named Earl. He's a Vietnam war veteran, a drunk, and a drug addict--and wanting the truth. On Thursday, he and a friend were sitting on the corner of Towne and 5th just drinking and talking like any other day on Skid Row. But his friend got up and walked across the street. And a Toyota pick-up pulled up and a shot sounded. And Earl's friend went to face his eternal fate.

Earl didn't explain why his friend was shot. But he did explain the impact that event had on him. I read Job out loud to him and he started crying. I read John 1 and we talked about the Savior, how our only hope is that of Job, "I know my Redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand on the earth."

He begged us to tell him how he can be sure of his eternal fate...I can still hear his earnest "please, please tell me" ringing in my ears. And so my friends explained salvation, about how we have to make Jesus Christ both savior and lord. And there's the problem. Earl doesn't want to give up his sin. "It's so hard here," he said. And I believe him. It's so hard for me to fight sin living at the Master's College, surrounded by almost every conceivable help to living a holy life. How much harder it must be on the streets of Skid Row, where sin in its basest and most addicting forms is available at every corner.

We talked to him for almost two hours, reading the Word and preaching the truth. And still when we left he told us that he was going to finish his bottle before going to sleep. My heart broke. How could he so earnestly desire to know the truth and still cling so stubbornly to his besetting sins? We tried to show him the true beauty of God and how much more valuable He is than anything else, we prayed for him, we (I) cried as we brought his plight before God. And yet I still can't shake the thought that he's going to sleep tonight on the sidewalks of Skid Row not knowing where he might wake up.

So I'm asking you to pray for him. Pray that God will break the power sin has over him in order to bring Earl to Himself. Please.