GOING OUT AMONGST THEM

The story is told of Gautama, later known as the Buddha or Enlightened One, that he left the comforts of a palace to get acquainted with the world out there. The son of a ruler, he knew nothing of suffering and hardship. Once outside the palace he saw a poor man starving and a sick man suffering. He saw death for the first time as a corpse passed by him, being carried out for burning. This caused him to ask, Is all life full of pain? He was told that life was full of suffering and that it ends only in death and that it is the fate of us all.

Nothing would satisfy Gautama but to leave his family and palatial comforts and go out into the world in search of the answer to the human predicament of life of suffering. He wandered for years, consulting with wise men, studying sacred writings, meditating. Like Solomon before him, he made a pragmatic test of every theory and tried every scheme, to see if he could come up with the answer to man’s problem of suffering. Finally he came up with his answer, which became the basic tenets of Buddhism, the religion of some 470 millions today in the orient.

The root of all our misery, he concluded, is our ignorance and the desire born of ignorance. Overcoming desire is therefore basic to oriental religion, which comes by seeing through the illusion of one’s separate existence, thus losing one’s self in service to others. Serenity is thus possible in this world, by overcoming selfish desire, and nirvana (the perfect bliss) in the next world. All this laid the groundwork for Buddha’s Eightfold Path and the Four Noble Truths, which make Buddhism the most ethical of all the non-Christian religions.

All this happened because a rich prince, with the right ingredients of character, got out amongst the people. Had he stayed within his majestic surroundings, satisfied with his own proud comforts, the world would have been the worse off for it. Once he got out amongst them he was touched by what he saw, people like himself suffering from want, an experience he had never had.

Francis of Assisi, Italy is a similar story, though his was motivated by an undying desire to be like Jesus. He too was born of the rich, and his prominent father disinherited him when he insisted upon living a simple, ascetic life. It was a dramatic moment when his father took him before the bishop to disown him, only to have his son disrobe himself before them all, avowing that he wanted nothing in this world except to serve God by ministering to the poor and needy.

It was the world out there, the world of agony and suffering, that touched Francis. Earlier in life he was given to selfish pride and pleasures, and it took sickness to cause him to take spiritual things more seriously. Once while riding along on horseback he saw a pitiable leper along the road, covered with sores and misery. Dismounting, Francis went to him and embraced him, identifying with his suffering. The rest of his life he gave to the ministry of the poor and needy, especially to lepers, resolving all along to take Jesus as his example.

Born in 1181 as he was, he knew only the Roman Church, and yet his message to the despised of earth was of the goodness and mercy of God rather than any sectarian doctrine. He was always a layman and never performed “priestly” functions, but was content to do the most menial tasks in leper camps as he spoke of the love of Jesus. He went on to found what is now known as the Franciscan order, but even before his death it moved away from the strict mission that he set for it.

We should thank God for men like Gautama and Francis, even though they are far from our own religious tradition, for they were so touched by human suffering as to dedicate their lives to their fellow man. But it would have never happened if they had remained within the narrow confines of their selfish little world. Graham Greene spoke wisely when he said that “We always have to choose between suffering our own pain or suffering other people’s. We can’t not suffer.” Thank God for those who choose to bear the sufferings of others rather than revel in morbid self pity.

It is alarming to realize how easy it is for us to be insulated from the troubled world even as we move about in it. We can cut out our own beaten path in the world around us and remain virtually untouched by those who are less fortunate than ourselves. I have been impressed that at nearly every great university I have visited in many nations, including our own, there is squalor and poverty in the same neighborhood. It is common to see an elegant cathedral towering above a community that is largely made up of the disadvantaged. It seems to be such a cruel contrast. The very things the university and the church stand for appear to be contradicted by conditions at their very door.

A case can be made for “the Ivory Tower” attitude on a college campus, for it will be soon enough for young people to get involved in the world’s problems once they leave college. Let the four years in college be a time of study and preparation. Isolation in the tower will pay dividends later on if it means that young people will go out better prepared. Too much social action while they are students will erode the process of preparation. I had rather trust a physician who devoted all his energies to learning while in medical school than one who divided his time between study and medical reform. We are saying that there is justification for not “going out amongst them” if one is preparing himself so that he can do more when he does go.

But how can we justify a congregation or the individual disciple of Jesus, especially our leaders, for isolationist attitudes and practices? We criticize the hippies and “the weird set” for their involvements while we remain frozen in our real estate. We hardly have time to serve humanity for always going to services where there is no service. Our people are not out where the action is. Hardly do we make a hospital visit except to see someone special. We do not call on the shut-ins, the aged, the poor, the imprisoned. We are out of touch with the very people who our Lord came to minister to. Seldom do we cross racial, social, denominational lines. We are walled-in by our own kind: white, middle-class, affluent Americans.

There is no way to estimate the good that would come if a congregation called off its Wednesday evening meeting in lieu of a “night of ministry.” That night each person or family would “go out amongst them” with the view of serving Jesus by serving humanity. Some of them could visit other churches, if for no other reason than to be friendly to Pentecostals, Mormons, and Seventh Day Adventists, or just plain Baptists. Some could visit the jails or call on the aged in the many rest homes that have popped up in every community. There are always old folk who long for someone to read to them or write letters for them. It is silly to be going to church all the time in a world that needs help like ours does.

It is noteworthy that both Gautama and Francis, though religious leaders, never served humanity in church buildings. Gautama moved through the streets where the people were. Francis did a lot of manual work, mending houses and fences for the poor, then moving on to leper colonies. Instead of tying up several hours of a couple’s time in a building, where only sermonizing goes on, why not encourage them to do such things as gather up a few of the children of tired mothers who have to work and spend those hours with the kids at the park?

Jesus was this way. He did not come to minister to himself but to others. He was out where the action was, where the people were, where the problems were. How beautiful that passage that reads: “You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Co. 8:9). People did not have to search out some cathedral to find the Master. He was out amongst them in the twilight zones of life.

As a professor and editor I see the risk of being too far removed from the ordinary experiences of those I seek to influence. It is all right to walk with kings if one does not lose the common touch. I can isolate myself in a world of books and ideas, office chores and editorial details, to the point that I remove myself from the nitty-gritty problems that weigh upon my students and subscribers. I do not want to be that kind of teacher that knows nothing about the world around him except what he sees by peeking out from behind a book or what he sees from an office window. Nor do I want to be an editor that is out of touch with all the different kinds of people around the world who read what I write. As I sit here writing I like to recall to mind the many homes and individuals who I know personally or have corresponded with extensively to whom this article will be mailed. I like to think about the kind of work they do, the problems they have, their triumphs and their tragedies, their limitation of time or schooling.

In one of my classes this year at Bishop College was a married student who began to be absent and fall behind in his work. I learned that his wife was ill in a Dallas hospital. So I went to the hospital to visit his wife, to meet her for the first time. She was weighed down and strapped up with all the contraptions that go with serious surgery. She was unable to talk and did not need visitors anyway, so I spoke quietly with her Mother who was sitting with her and made a quick exit. Later I called again when she was able to have company and got in my visit. But once the young man was back in class trying to unravel philosophical problems that were difficult enough without having to worry about a sick wife, I had a better grasp of the situation as the professor. And he could see that I was a fellow human being who cared, and not some college professor far removed from his troubled world.

This is why I am pleased to get out amongst those who read this paper as I have been doing lately in these mini-meetings. I meet readers of this journal whom I would never know any other way. All sorts of folk in all sorts of places. We do a lot of talking and studying, praying and visiting. Surely I am the one who is most benefitted. I sit down to this typewriter with a better understanding of what needs to be said these days, though I may not be able to say it as it should be said.

I have just returned from a little meeting in the sticks of Ohio, a little place that is not even on the map. My travel agent told me that I couldn’t go to such a place, for it doesn’t exist! But we did find it by driving a hundred miles or so from the Columbus airport, and I found nestled in those hills some of the dearest and most delightful people on earth. They meet in a little chapel beside a country road, inherited from the Methodists who have long since deserted the place. They seldom see a “real preacher,” for they are small and poor and nobody is interested much in them. Besides, you can’t find the place! They are mostly Church of Christ folk, instrumental and non-instrumental, though they use the instrument.

They were most courteous to any prejudices that I might be harboring, so they offered to dispense with the instrument while I was there. I insisted that they do as they always do, and let me accommodate myself to them. Besides, insofar as fellowship with my brethren is concerned I have declared instrumental music a non-issue. One brother played the piano and another thumped a mandolin. At one point in the service they softly played How Great Thou Art while I looked out through the back door of the chapel at the sunset in those glorious Ohio valley hills. I was tempted to say, under my breath at least, “Almost thou persuadest me!” That evening I delivered a message based on the first paragraph of I John, dealing in particular with the two things that the apostle desired for his readers: (1) that they might enjoy fellowship with each other and with God, and (2) that their joy in the Lord might be complete. I showed the relationship between joy and fellowship and observed that we have become a people with little of either.

While there I called on a resident minister in a nearby town; an old brother now confined but who received a sample copy of my publication 18 ago and is still a subscriber; a bedfast sister whose body is warped by paralysis but who keeps a song in her heart; an 82 year old man who ventures no further than his front porch but fondly recalls the vigors of youth; a couple who married in the twilight of life, the man being a bachelor until he was 70; and still others.

The last couple I found most endearing. Life was mostly spent before they ever married, but they are finding something of a bonus in each other. She worked as a charwoman during the years of her widowhood, so she could easily adapt herself to the simple life they live together in the Ohio woods, selling a few eggs and tending a modest garden and orchard. They love dogs, cats and birds, sharing their modest home with all three. They have both a piano and an organ, and when they play them together, nine cages of birds join the chorus, the dogs whine, and a merry tune fills the house.

While I was there their most beloved little dog lay dying in a house apart. The brother, now in his 80’s but still vigorous, told of how the dog would lay in his lap and cradle his head under his chin, and would sometimes give him a kiss on the nose. He would go out to the dying dog and try to feed and comfort him, only to see a helpless response. His wife would urge him not to go anymore, for it only grieved him.

I thought of Francis of Assisi amidst all the cats, dogs and birds, of how he would talk to animals as if they were persons, and would even preach to them. His disciples testify that sometimes when he was preaching to the birds, the swallows would sing too noisily, but would quieten down when Francis would urge them to! With such as that coming out of the history books, how could I begrudge an old couple, with too few to love them, for their infatuation with a dog. I wasn’t quite ready to pray for the dog’s healing, but I was sympathetic and I understood — and I listened.

As I bade this dear couple goodbye after meeting on Sunday, the old brother came by and warmly held my hand, thankful that he had a new friend. I got the latest report on the dog and listened to his concern for a neighbor who was to have surgery the next day. “I’m not long for the world myself,” he said, his eyes watery. His wife came by and laid her head on my shoulder and wept-not for the dog nor for the sick neighbor especially. She was weeping because there was somebody around who had showed some interest in them, someone who seemed to care. Someone who came to see them and fell in love with them.

There they trudged down the country road, single file, back to their home, their dogs, cats and birds. I was touched that they would bear with them a tear for me, a new friend and brother. There they go, I thought, like the poet’s last leaf on the tree, not long for this world, true, and with little of what the world has to offer. But there was something real about them, something sweet and gentle. There was suffering going on in their world and they cared.

I turned away with a lump in my throat. At first I did not speak to those who drove me away. Finally I said, “You know, the Bible tells us that it was the simple folk who gladly listened to Jesus. There goes the kind of people who would gladly hear Jesus if he were in their midst today.”

I was thankful that I had got out amongst them. I only regret that I am not a poet so that I might catch the drama as well as the truth of such experiences. May God grant that it will make me a tenderer, more loving, more understanding teacher and editor. — the Editor