A Day at McDonald's

I met Don at McDonald's. I only go to McDonald's to escape. I bring a good book, purchase the $1 hot fudge sundae, and hide in the corner for several hours - reading the world away.

I guess Don doesn't read body-language very well.

"What are you reading?" he asked from a table away. Great, I thought. Some creepy guy wants to have a conversation with me during my McDonald's "escape" time.

I pretended I didn't hear him and continued reading.

"What are you reading?" he asked again, this time louder. I couldn't ignore him.

"Just a book." I replied drily.

"I love reading ..." he started and just kept talking for 30 minutes [I'm not exaggerating here]. He told me about the books he'd read recently. He told me about a season of his life where he received unemployment and just lived on a boat and read for 3 years.

I said nothing and tried to look very uninterested ... but he just kept talking. Halfway through his monologue, my heart changed ... "Is this you, Jesus?"

I started to really listen to Don. He didn't remind me of a creepy guy anymore. He reminded me of a man looking for someone to talk to. Someone to listen.

Still not wanting to stay long, I excused myself and stood up to leave.

"What do you do?" he asked.

What the heck! I'm moving to Texas in three days... "I teach the Bible at a campus here in Ozark called YWAM." I replied.

"I read the Bible once," he said, "cover-to-cover."

"What'd you think?" I asked.

Don preceded to tell me about an experience he'd had with a Gideon Bible, given to him by a friend at work. "I read in the back where it talks about being born again. I did all the steps and walked down to the shore to baptist myself ..." He continued, " 'Read the Bible cover-to-cover' was the next step after baptism. So, I drove to B & N and bought a study Bible."

"And you read the whole thing?" I asked, blown away. Only 30% of born again Christians have read the entire New Testament, let alone the entire Bible.

"Well, I tried ... I quit somewhere in the middle of Acts."

"So, what do you think of Jesus?" I asked, still standing to leave.

Don talked more about what he'd read: excerpts from the writings of the Dalai Lama, a well-known atheist and the Bible. He was unsure of the character and deity of Jesus.

Don and I talked about what the lifestyle of a Christian should look like ... are there absolute sins? are there preferences and gray areas? ... we talked mostly about Paul's letter to the Romans - sin and Jesus' sacrifice. We talked about Paul's letters to the Corinthians - loving and preferring one another.

"Don, you stopped short of some of the best books of the Bible ... all the questions you're asking me come from Romans, and 1 & 2 Corinthians ... those are the next 3 books after Acts in your Bible. You should finish reading it."

"Oh ..." he paused, "okay, I will." And I know he will.

I also know God's Word speaks.

Praying Don understands and experiences a RELATIONSHIP with Jesus and not a step-by-step guide to spirituality.