Better than God.

If you are having me for company for more than 2 days, it is beneficial for the health of our relationship for you to have me wander about for a couple hours to read or mentally process.  Carrie didn't know this, but her work schedule during my visit to Missouri provided for such time anyway. 

Although I expected the three hours Carrie was at work in the library to be mostly full of me basking in the 70 degree November sun while drinking in Les Mis, I was sidetracked by an eager man in a sweater vest yelling about Obama.

I was vaguely familiar with what was happening in front of me.  I had been told earlier that this circle of cement in front of the library was a place where people could go to speak their mind.  Carrie told me that there was a man who came often to talk to college students about Jesus.

Brother Jed (for soon I learned he was called) was not talking about Jesus, but a plethora of socio-economic issues ranging from smoking cigarettes to gay people to us being brainwashed by Obama, our Master, but no, not Jesus.  15 minutes went by.  If I had been a casual passer-by, I would have had no idea what I was listening to, besides a crazy conservative man being mocked by about fifty college students. For, you see, that's all that was going on.  All of the students standing around Brother Jed were not there to hear the Gospel, or morality, or his opinions.  They were there to mock him.

Brother Jed, why doesn't your wife have a job? 

Brother Jed, why don't you have a real job?  

Brother Jed, shouldn't you raise money for the poor instead of collecting donations for yourself?

I have a question. 
It was my voice this time.  I stepped forward.  It was a sitcom moment, where all heads literally turned toward me.
"I have a question.  What are you doing here?  What are you trying to say?"
"I'm so glad you asked!" said Brother Jed.  "I'm here to talk about JESUS and the GOSPEL!"
"Really." I said. "Because I've been standing here for about 15 minutes and I haven't heard the Gospel yet."
People clapped.  AMEN!  said a voice.   
"You can sit down here," said a girl, wearing cheap neon sunglasses.
"I don't understand this man," I said.
"Yeah," she guffawed, "Neither do I.  I can't wait until Trevor gets here."
"Who's Treavor?"
"His boyfriend," she smirked, gesturing.  "They're going to make out in front of him.  I can't wait."

It was kind of like that moment when Harry Potter met Draco Malfoy for the first time.  Things started off alright until Draco made fun of Ron, and told Harry that he'll help him find the right kind of friends.  There's that awkward expectation of agreement to which I didn't know what to say.  Regardless of how I felt about a little boy-on-boy PDA, it was no way to prove a point; it was senseless; it was maddening; all of them--both Brother Jed and the snarky college students.

Brother Jed, what positions are okay during sex? 

Brother Jed smiled.  He was familiar with this game. "Anything is FINE!" he waved his arms in the air, "As long as the penis goes into the correct ORIFICE!" 

What orifice??

"The VAGINA!"

Twenty minutes later there were a couple of men making out in front of me, people clapping all around me, and Brother Jed shouting, "EVERYONE WHO CLAPS WILL BURN WITH THEM!"

"Nobody is hear to listen."  said a voice behind me.  I turned around.
"I know, right?"
"Everyone is just making fun of him.  Nobody cares what he has to say, and nobody takes him seriously."
"I was just thinking that.  It's ridiculous.  I doubt if he ever accomplishes anything," I said.
He sat down.  He told me his name, but it wasn't important.  We heard muttering to the side.

"It's just not the Gospel man, I don't know what everyone is doing here or why we're talking about this when it's not the Gospel..." a bearded guy a couple people over from us was muttering.  He could barely be heard over the neon sunglasses girl standing up next to Brother Jed screaming that her god was a god of love and acceptance to all.  We three gravitated toward each other.

Three Christians sitting in a sea of hate.

We started to play a game together.  Whenever someone asked a question, or made a rash comment, we pointed it toward the Gospel together, sitting there, while Brother Jed yelled and fumbled along, embarrassing himself and us.

"We would accomplish so much more if we were up there," I said, wistfully.  The boys smiled.

"OKAY.  Can I just ask a question??" the neon-glasses girl yelled.  "Who here believes in the God that Brother Jed talks about?"

I raised my hand, then put it down, then looked around, then looked at the two boys next to me.  They were equally confused.  Before we had time to think, her speech continued.

"Now who here believes in their own personal god who loves all no matter what?"

Everybody but us raised their hands.  One of the Christian boys spoke up.  "Can we not create these terms of 'his god' and 'your god' and maybe instead say 'The God of the Bible?'"

"Who would want that God?" a voice laughed 10 feet away.  We three turned.  A blond haired guy sat next to a hipster-looking guy, both starring at us, both laughing.

He posed a question to us.  "So tell me.  You believe in a God who created--according to him--only two people in the world, but then made law that incest was a condemnable sin?  A God who struck down people for making mistakes?"

"Well, we think,..." the mumbly Christian started.

"You think?" the atheist (for so he later called himself) laughed.

"Hold UP.  Wait a minute," I yelled.  "I'm not going to sit here and have us yell at each other while everyone else around us is yelling at each other about things that nobody is willing to listen to and discuss.  If you want to talk to us and if you really want to have a real conversation then let's have a discussion of respect." I went silent.

"Okay, sure!" said the atheist.  And he meant it, too.

-.-.-

No conversions happened that day, if that's what you are expecting.  What did happen was that amidst Brother Jed's circle of mockery, a new circle formed.  It started small, but eventually consisted of 4 atheists, 3 Christians, and 2 people who just wanted to sit and listen to us talk.  We talked about their questions, ranging from incest, to the literal/metaphorical nature of the fire and brimstone in hell, to what makes our religion so attractive to outsiders, to the God of the Old Testament versus the God of the New, to the concept of "faith," which was an answer to many of their questions that they found unfufilling.

When things got a little heated between us, the hipster atheist spoke up.

"Listen," he said.  "Don't take our arguments personally, you guys.  We like you a lot better than that guy," he gestured to Brother Jed.  "Hell, we like you a lot better than the God of the Old Testament.  You seem a lot nicer than he was.  It's like you guys know how be God better than God," he laughed.

Conversation started to dwindle at that point, so after about two hours I left to go gather my thoughts.  As I said goodbye, the whole circle waved back.  Hipster atheist smiled.  "Thanks for talking to us," he said.

I'm not sure if appearing "better than the God of the Old Testament" is a good thing in an atheist's eyes.  I know that I didn't have much to say, that my biblical exegesis is pretty limited, and that I wished I had the right words.  I know that it's easier to talk about God when you're sitting on cement with strangers 400 miles from home, and I know that there were many of their questions that tested my own faith.  Faith--a concept which was, inevitably, my answer to their hardest questions.

I'm certain everyone there that day grew in one way or another--Christians and atheists alike.  All because we sat down and had a discussion.