"Are you sure it's safe to go and meet him again," my wife asked.
I had just told her about my weird conversation with a man at the bar. I gave him my card and told him to let me know if he needed someone to talk to. He texted me soon after I came home. He needed to talk and didn't want to go home yet.
"It's fine, honey," I said, trying to console her. "He's not like the weird guy at the end of American Sniper."
"How did you know I was thinking about that?" I didn't tell her as I was walking out the door, but I was thinking that too.
When this young man sat down next to me at the pub, I noticed right away that it would be an atypical discussion. The young man's answers to my questions were slow and succinct. He kept saying that he led a rather boring life. But he also kept talking about a male best friend of his--how long they had known each other and how much time they spend together.
Eventually, I said "I know people don't talk about these things as much out here, but are you in a relationship with this man?" He said they had talked about it. So I knew he was gay.
The conversation continued to drag along until this young man announced that he was going to go meet up with his best friend at another pub. As always, I handed him my card and told him to let me know if he ever needed to talk. I left a bit after he did and arrived home just in time to get his first text.
Before I knew it, instead of filling my wife in on the uneasy encounter, I was racing back to the center of town. My sense of unease was heightened by my parting words with the bartender. He told me that he had toured the country in a punk band for three years so that he could enjoy that once in a lifetime opportunity. I told him about the summer I went to Africa for two months and tried out for American Idol. I love adventures. But with kids, the adventures become rare. But it's worth it.
I left the bar by paraphrasing a John Calvin quote from his commentary on Acts 20:24--"It is a pity when one's obsession with life obscures one's purpose in life."
Now those words were coming back to haunt me in the car. I pictured the young man, packing heat, waiting for me outside the bar. I prayed that if the Lord willed to take my life, then to please do so in order to save another life. But, I continued, if it be your will, please give me a bit more time with my wife and kids.
When I arrived, I found the young man playing the electronic slot machines. He was packing the other Wisconsinite weapon of choice--a beer. I sat down next to him and we began to talk in a much more substantive manner.
This man's best friend has just told him that he might move away and he couldn't bare the thought. He admitted that he was in love with this man. I told him that often times, when we don't have a religion, our religion becomes the person next to us. That person assumes God-like proportions in our life (Rom. 1). He agreed that this man was at the center of his own religious system.
He told me that he as more standoff-ish with me earlier because I told him I was a pastor. (That wasn't the only reason he seemed off--he's on 21 medications for various physical and psychological disorders.) But he reconsidered when I told him that I am in the Army. He figured that I had counseled lots of people like him (I have--whether he was referring to his lifestyle or disorders).
For stretches of time, I would just let him talk about life. He continued to drink down craft beers and explained that in Wisconsin, this was how you got men to talk with you. That is also one of the reasons why I ventured out into the pub scene quite often.
I asked him what hope he had beyond this man. If this man moved away, in other words, what did he have to live for? He said that he hoped to meet new friends in the LGBT community.
I suggested to him that instead of trying to find a few friends, he find a new community. I told him that he was welcome in our home and in our church.
His eyes lit up, "Is your church LGBT friendly?"
"We are sinner-friendly," I responded. "Jesus said that He came for the sick, not the healthy; sinners, not the righteous. You would have a place there because every sinner finds grace there."
I also told him that he needed friends who would BS him. The worst sort of friend is the one who gives you an unconditional pass, not unconditional love.
Those two things are very different. Christians need not apologize for standing on truth (in a gracious manner). It is cruel to let someone lounge on the couch in a house that is on fire. It is callous to not call someone to aim higher than their own petty, everyday desires.
Before I left, I asked him if he would be okay (yes) and he let me pray with him. Throughout our conversation, I kept picturing this young man as a little boy like my own. I imagined all that must have transpired for it to unfold in this heart-rending way. I earnestly ached for the plight of this prodigal.
Lord, help me to die more and more to myself, so that in and through me, others might see Your perfect patience for sinners like me, and live.
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