38. Called to Hang With Jas

Before I get into the blog I want to comment on something – I was disturbed by an article in the Huffington Post a few weeks ago.  The head line read -

“Prayer Alone Heals Mental Illness, Say One Third Of Americans In LifeWay Research Poll”

If you are one of those one in three people please do me a favour.  The next time you have an abscess tooth do not seek treatment, rather pray for the delivery from that pain and misery.  Yes, mental illness may just be in your head, but so are your teeth and if prayer works for one it will work for another.

Now on to the blog -

Proverbs 3:5 – 6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

An acquaintance of mine, I think at some point he will be closer to friend, is an amazing man.  I met him over a year ago when a friend of mine said, “Hey Drew, would you come with me and check out this guy, he is either really crazy or God is really moving things with him.”

          As it turns out, both were true. 

        Jas has a simple vision, feed poor people good food.  God does the rest.  Jas acquired a farm for a dollar a year.  And had a tractor given to him, and other implements.  He asked to borrow a fork lift and was told to keep it.  Other people have given him land, gas, seed, and other stuff.  He reminds me of another lunatic for the Lord that created a theatre group.

          Jas is a devoted Christian, you would not know it unless you got to talk to him, and only after a while.  But he is passionate and you can tell that from a distance. He is passionate about the food we eat, he is passionate about making sure no one goes hungry. 

          I go ever so often to the farm he runs.  By every so often, I think maybe eight times in two seasons.  Mostly I go to take another friend of mine who finds comfort in an evening of doing something.  I have gone on my own, but mostly it is with my other friend.

          Jas makes a big deal out of my being there.  He is a humble man, and I am not sure if he realizes the modesty of my commitment to what he is up to.  But it is one of those projects that when we all take a turn, we do wonders with one or two evenings a month.  But he does tell me that he appreciates my efforts.

          I was there the other night, helping to wash carrots. Jas and I got to talking.  After pondering the female and male anatomical likeness of some of the carrots we got into more serious stuff,  He had been providing the carrots to a local charity.  Clean organic carrots, and truly organic, which a produce retailer has approached him about wanting to buy the crop.  The carrots were grown to be given away.  So, he turned down the offer.  At which point the charity, for reasons I don’t think God even gets, said they did not want his carrots. Something about the shape and size were not consistent..

          It was a relief that Jas has been subjected to something more stupid than I.  I know that is not very nice of me, but in that week of stupidity, it was somehow comforting to know that I had been trumped.  But it was what happened next that was truly uplifting. 

          Jas began to talk of what was next, and the carrots could be added to hampers and sold so that other food could be bought and then distributed through various churches.  His mission was to feed poor people good food.  It mattered not what organized bureaucratic nonsense stood in his way, he was feeding poor people good food.

          As we talked, he talked of all that had been done for him on the farm.  People felt compelled from a sense of compassion to help.  He was trying to get an atheist group from Seattle to come up and help, which for numerous reasons delighted me.  He had appealed on TV for assistance when the crops were dying in the fields from not being picked.  Close to 500 people showed up.

          He is an amazing man, or rather, he has moved enough out of the way so that God is able to do amazing things with him.

We are called to be each other Jas’s.  But we are also called to hang with our version of Jas. I have a couple of people who do that for me.  Men, for reasons that I will explain at another post, who inspire me and who just being with bring a deeper peace to my being.

          One of first my teachers said, and I paraphrase, “When you and I can lose the bullshit and just be with each other, person to person, God is in that space.”

          I have had moments of being with God.  They always seem to be with other people.  We are called to allow our spirit and soul to be rejuvenated.  Jas does that for me.  Other people, well it is more akin to intellectual boxing, fun but not as soothing.  Jas on the other hand - is what need every so often.