people

I love the story in the Bible about Andrew, the disciple of Jesus who, after meeting Jesus, ran to his friend Nathanael and told him Who he had found.  Nathanael's response was somewhat derogatory, but he went with Andrew to see this man.  When Jesus saw them coming he said to those among him, "Look who is coming.  A true Hebrew in whom there is nothing false."  Jesus' first words to Nathanael were, "I saw you under the fig tree."  Nathanael instantly believed in Jesus, and became a disciple. 

I grew up in an area of the country riddled by the stench of pride and enslaved to prejudice.  Besides having an open prejudice towards minorities, a strong prideful religious attitude among the locals accompanied it.  Attending a Christian school of another denomination, I was singled out by students and staff a few times and ridiculed for my (parent's) beliefs.  Attending public school it was beneath most of my friends to befriend the "poor" or "special needs" kids, who were ruthlessly ridiculed or shunned.  The jocks hated the nerds, the preps were above everyone, blue-collar beer-drinking trailer dwellers were looked down on by the white-collar upstanding christian folk, etc.  Maybe it sounds like the town you grew up in.  I always felt this underlying tension everywhere.  It was as if everyone had secrets, something that happened "under the fig tree," that they were trying to hide from everyone else, and had to act that way to feel superior to make themselves forget it.  I never quite understood why people couldn't just treat everyone with the same level of respect and kindness.

Poosal was the town drunk.  He lived alone in a trailer in the woods across the road from our house.  I never knew if he'd ever been married.  He didn't seem to have any anyone except his parents who lived in the house next to his trailer.  People in town did not have much good to say about Poosal.  By all means he was marginalized because of his drinking.  Sometimes I would go walking in the woods behind his house and he would be out on his little deck drinking beer and we'd start talking.  He would sit there listening, amused by whatever crazy yarn I was spinning.  He'd pat me on the back and always say something positive to me like, "Aubrey, yer sump'n else, boy.  Don't ever change..."  I enjoyed his company, and he seemed to enjoy mine, and I always went away from him feeling good about myself.  Mom and Dad were always kind to everyone, but kept their distance and probably wished I would do the same.  One day my sister and I came home from school and we were locked out of the house, Mom and Dad both gone.  There was a terrible storm kicking up and Poosal saw me failing at trying to break in to the house.  He brought my sister and me into his parents' house, offered us snacks and koolaid, and sat with us until the storm passed and Mom came home.  It made me think how someone so shunned by society had something soft and tender in his heart towards us, who sort of represented the people he was shunned by.  He genuinely cared, even though everyone swore he cared for nothing.  I still wonder what could have happened "under his fig tree."


Nowadays I am haunted by those same old ignorant ghosts floating around in different sheets as I observe people I know and love struggling under the weight of extra-strenuous circumstances in their lives.  They are mistreated and misunderstood by people, some who's job it is to help them, all who are responsible as humans to simply be kind.  Religious or not, why can't people make room for the things they do not understand about others rather than demanding they come up to their standard?  I have worked with people with disabilities for many years and have noticed how they are so marginalized by the mainstream.  I watch their family members toiling under grueling circumstances trying to just get through the day, and then I hear some guy at work make a stupid remark about "people who poop in their pants and lick windows."  My first urge is to punch him in the face!!  But then I think, "If that guy could be made, somehow, to walk in their shoes for an hour, he would never say anything like that ever again."       


Jesus saw Nathanael under the fig tree.  What happened there?  What life-altering event twisted Nathanael's world so that he became that cynical man who answered Andrew's petition with such stinking pride and ugly prejudice?  There is no evidence of an answer to that question.  But we need to understand that everyone of us has been the guy "under the fig tree," and the guy making ignorantly prejudice remarks about it. On some level, we have all been both victim and perpetrator.  We have all done things we are not proud of at the least, and are downright embarrassed by at most.  Who you are, what you think you have, your education, credentials, pedigree, religion, social standing, NONE of these things make anyone better or superior to anyone else.  "There is NONE righteous.  No, not one."  One is not obligated to try to understand another.  A person is only obligated to confess their NON-understanding, and then respect the other person.  Then, if you are really brave, you might just throw yourself out there and see if you can't learn something about what you don't understand.  The first lesson is this:  everyone has something they hide, and something to bring out and give away.

The cool thing about Nathanael is that when faced with his inconsistency, that tender, embarrassing spot in his life, he flatly acknowledged it.  He saw Jesus relating honestly, lovingly, patiently, and personally to him.  And because he was that "true Hebrew in whom there was nothing false", it changed his life.  I would love it, on my pilgrim journey, if, when people see me walking away, they could say of me, "There goes a true man of faith, real and true to the bone."