Lessons I learned from Nadeek

He stands at the edge of the kitchen. Slight and muscled, with rich brown skin, the young-ish man in jeans and polo shirt watches and waits. His stance is erect. His brown eyes are alert, yet calm. Invisible, yet fully present. Willing to do nothing; ready to do anything.

The house is quiet, but a walk from room to room counts a dozen or more people reading, resting, scribbling in journals, praying. Christians leaning into the Lord Jesus in a space set apart for them this day.

We are hosts to a silent retreat. Men and women spread in comfortable chairs, or on cushions piled in a corner. Others stand gazing out the window or into a painting. Nadeek is not a participant. He is here to serve, to make sure the juice pitcher is full, the fruit bowl is replenished, and the dishes get washed. He works for us.

I work, too. As retreat leader, chief cook, and hostess I have plenty to do. Still, Nadeek’s undivided attention arrests me.

I am here to serve, a guardian of space, peace and the silence conducive to focus and meditation. Yet within all that I have my own agenda. I, too, desire as much holy solitude as I can carve for myself. So I come and go from my space in the study. My attention is divided.

“I lift up my eyes to You, to You whose throne is in heaven. …As the eyes of a maid look to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till He shows us His mercy.” Psalm 123:1-2.

I see myself as servant. Yet Nadeek takes me aback. How flawed is my understanding of genuine servanthood. As a creature of the West, where individual trumps community, I see “service” is an activity of the moment. “My time” is to be maximized to get in as much “me-time” as I can around my responsibilities to others.

Nadeek is from Sri Lanka, a child of the East. He turns “servant” into a dignified profession as he gives me a lesson in humility. I asked him to help out with lunch and dishes. He is otherwise free to disappear into his own pursuits. I don’t see “enough” for him to do. Nadeek, on the other hand, sees this set-apart day as filled with opportunities to bless in quiet ways and has set himself as guardian. Most of the day he will stand invisible, but empty cups magically disappear, tea and coffee are ever replenished, the kitchen serving area is spotless. The smallest needs are intercepted before they have a chance to become disruptions.

Suddenly I stand on holy ground as witness to the heart and soul of a true servant. Nadeek could be out about town, resting, or pouring over his beloved sports page. But his master has something going, and he can’t imagine not being there, alert to faces and body language, giving full support to my agenda as he attends those I’ve taken in today.

“Teach me your way, O Lord, and I will walk in Your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear Your name. I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify Your name forever.” Psalm 86:11-12.

With gratitude to my teacher, Nadeek.

Full-time

Curt did something really cool the other day. We were teaching at the Torchbearer school in Albania and were asked to “give our testimony” as a way of introducing ourselves.

Curt started by asking if anyone knew what he did in his work. As I think about it, I suppose all their other teachers are pastors or missionaries or somehow in full-time employment in the church. Curt’s an oil guy. He works the upstream (subsurface) side of things—the side of the industry that gets that dark green stuff up out of the ground--and he loves his work. That came clear as he described to the students some of the excitment of getting a six-inch pipe and drill bit through several miles of rock to reach the deep places of trapped oil. “Miles” and “barrels” and “millions” and “billions” peppered his sharing.

Translator, students, staff—the collective mental gasp registered on their faces. “This is a testimony?”

Curt went on to speak of the people he works with: UAE nationals, Egyptians, Jordanians, Sudanese. Men and women. All Muslims. He talked about ways he and his colleagues share their lives in the workplace, and how much he enjoys his co-workers and the challenges they embrace as a multi-cultural team. I didn’t know that some of them call him “the preacher.” Curt also talked some about the people who come to our house, and the food, games, conversation, studies, movies and prayer that happen in our living room.

As Curt and I travel and occasionally get to teach or preach in the US, Europe or Asia people often ask what mission board we serve with. They look so disappointed when we tell them that an oil company brought us to the Middle East.

So often we think of “ministry” as something “missionaries” and “pastors” do. Or something we “normal people” do in our spare time under the auspices of some church program. Something with a title and a job description to validate it. “Youth worker.” “Sunday school teacher.” “Board member.” And don’t we elevate in degrees of status or hierarchy those who make their living from the church over those whose income derives from “secular” work?

Yet the human calling, from creation, is to fill the earth and subdue it. (Genesis 1:28.) To live in this world God made and to care for it, use it, steward it, tend to it.

We are spiritual beings, but we are also physical--of the earth and earthy. This earth God put us in charge of is full of possibilities, but it needs to be creatively, enthusiastically tended if it is to supply human need—especially as we live out the other charge to multiply and fill it up. To be a farmer or a scientist or a doctor or a water-quality inspector or a day-care provider or a bookkeeper or a civil servant or a mother—OR AN OIL GUY—is a HOLY calling.

Curt’s testimony vividly illustrated his self-understanding: “I am a full-time Christian!” No distinction exists between his “secular” and his “sacred” work. It all belongs to God. Whether he is planning a new well, engaged in dialogue about faith, exploring the back alleys and souks, or playing a game in our living room, if he is there because Jesus opened the way and gifted him to be there, and if his heart is submitted and attentive, God will be glorified and His Kingdom will be advanced.

And that’s COOL!