"I've Been Away So Long"

Galileo Church • February 2018

A few weeks ago, a newish soul at Galileo Church posted in our Facebook group, where we share prayer requests and knock-knock jokes and outrage and stuff. With that person's permission we're sharing her post almost ver batim. This is what can happen when spiritual refugees are invited back into the spaces from which they were excluded. This is how the Spirit of the living Christ works in us.

I hope it isn’t too late to post on the page, but I need to share. I just got home from a very fun night with S and J, who are great friends and fellow musicians. Even though J and S are very liberal, they have some friends that come to hear them play who are not particularly my cup of tea.

I’ve tried so hard for a couple of years to keep my distance from a particular couple among their friends. His FB posts are Anti-Everything-I-Believe and I have personally witnessed him being an absolute dick to his wife. I’ve just thought it best for him and me to not have that confrontation. It’s always been very cordial and polite; you know, the plastic, “Hi, how are ya”; “Good, thank you.”

BUT as it happens, I was leaving the event tonight and they happened to be fumbling around trying to figure out how to do the Uber thing. Something came over me and I said, “Get your asses in the truck; I’ll take you home.” Jesus!!! Must have been the whiskey!

Just so happens, he had a serious health scare in December. I had kept an eye on it via FB just to make sure the ol’ SOB made it. Obviously he did.

They got in my truck and off we went. I spent the next hour-and-a-half visiting with them. Keep in mind, I’ve known these people for a couple of years, but just refused to get too close because he is such a old, white man with conservative leanings. Royal asshole!!!

(It’s not that I can’t love someone like that. I just don’t want to tell him to his face what a jackass he is, and he makes me so mad!)

SO, we talked, laughed, and sang songs; and I told him how lucky he was to be alive, and how he should appreciate his wife more because without her he would be a dead piece of crap. My words exactly! He hugged me and complimented me, told me how much he admired me, blah blah… I took a few deep breaths, then hugged him back. And then…

I headed home and tears filled my eyes. I began to think: “It’s Galileo’s fault!!! I want to NOT LIKE them so much!!”

Maybe, just maybe, I’ve spent the last 25 or so years filled with anger, resentment, suspicion, caution – and now I have to face the fact that for my life to be peaceful, I have to accept the people I just don’t like. I guess it is after all, “What Jesus would do?” UGH, I really hate that phrase, but I know it is the ultimate goal and where I will find the ultimate peace.

Sorry if this sounds like the ramblings of a fool. I’ve been away so long, it’s hard to be open and vulnerable again. I really just don’t want to. I don’t want to. But here I am.

This essay has been published in We Were Spiritual Refugees: A Story to Help You Believe in Church (Eerdmans 2020) with the permission of its author. More about We Were Spiritual Refugees at katiehays.net.