The firm for which I work had a large event recently, and we’ve been having a number of celebrities around.
Saturday and Sunday I got to work Security for one of these celebrities, a kind, older gentleman at the center of so much hype at our Show.
The thing is, he’s sweet.
Not that famous people aren’t sweet, but he’s the kind of sweet who… well, let me introduce you to my Sunday:
Where: book signing in the center of the floor– the line has to cut across the hall
What: I’m letting 4 people at a time in our cordoned off area to be next for the signing, and keeping the aisle moving for traffic (photographers and gawkers and people having conversation were being redirected… nicely)
When: He is there for 2 hours exactly, after which point he is to be escorted to another engagement
There were people who waited in line for an hour to have him sign their books… and all of those people got in. We cut off after a certain number– mostly people who were buying the book at 3:30 and getting in line… and let them know the line was closed– we actually had a staff member there turning people away so they wouldn’t waste their time waiting in line.
The problem was this: Once we closed the line and cordoned off the area, our sweet friend wanted to eat. There. Where we were using stanchions to keep people from shoving their books over his sandwich, wanting a signature and perhaps some smeared mustard.
And EVERY person who was able to stick their books through some tiny gap, over heads or between hips, got a signed book– if he saw the book, he smiled at the person, asked their name, wanted to chat, and addressed & signed the cover.
We got out of there some 20 minutes late because he was less concerned… well, not at all concerned about the schedule.
He was concerned about people, about making them feel valued…
about holding and kissing the hand of the woman who could hardly speak, she was so excited to meet him…
about stopping to take a picture with every person who had a camera…
about looking people in the eye and smiling and making every single person feel as if he or she was the only person in that room
As I explained to a fellow worker, being too sincere and engaging is one of the better flaws to have.
It got me to thinking about what it would have been like to have done
public relations for Jesus. Usually, this is my thought when I’m realizing the crowds he’s turning away, the people he’s around… (I’m with Judas– can we at least ask for money while we’re here? We could pay for our own fish and loaves, rather than asking the kid!)
But Sunday I thought about the events… the miracles… the speaking engagement at the mount of olives… the escaping into a boat so he could teach… about his insistence, while going from one place to the next, on stopping to heal and to teach and to look at women in the eye and kiss their hands and tell them they are loved.
For me, learning to slow down in my life is a lesson that seems never ending. I go through seasons where I’m great it it (too great, sometimes) and seasons where nothing could be further from my lifestyle.
But gosh– I look at this guy and I look at Jesus and I think to myself, how would life look different if I could do that? If I could be so present in every conversation, in every interaction, that people felt the dignity of being created in the Image of God when we spoke.
If I could stop for every person, for every need, every desire for a hug, every situation where I could bring a smile across someone’s face…
If I could
stop
for those moments,
pause and exist in them fully,
and then get on with my day– with all the emails and phone calls and meetings and follow up to conversations…
Intellectually, I know that at the end of my life I’m going to far more value the moments I made that person feel valued, and I’m not going to remember that it made me fifteen minutes late to work.
But, well, “meanwhile the cross comes before the crown and tomorrow is a Monday morning.”
It’s just that… it’s just that I watched this man for the two days I helped with crowd control, and I haven’t been able to get his face out of my mind.
The face that couldn’t care less about where he was supposed to be when, not when someone was waiting to be noticed and loved.
And I can’t help but think he’s got something I’m really missing out on. Something that his friends and family love about him because they always feel appreciated and adored. Something that looks a lot like what Jesus might have been like at 82… the same way he was at 30… and the same way I should probably be, too.
