Reflection: “No Flip Flops in Capernaum”

On Saturday, I joined 1400 church people for a picnic.

Technically, it was a festival. We call it Summerfest. It’s a family event with enough activities for everyone to find something to enjoy, and enough food for me to feel bad about my choices for several days.

They had 4 pools with slides, basketball courts, a softball field, go-karts, a zip line, golf, and beach volleyball.

They had canoeing, kayaking, pedal boats, roller skating, a dunk tank, bungee jumps, rock climbing, tennis, soccer, horseshoes, dodgeball, and bocce.

They had inflatable fun for kids, arts and crafts, and relay games. They had a live band and dancing.

I had burgers, hot dogs, chicken, pasta, and sodas. I had a snow cone for possibly the first time in 30 years.

It took place at Frogbridge Day Camp in Millstone, NJ. According to the Frogbridge website, it is so named for the villa of it’s original location, which required crossing a footbridge over a stream. And from the bridge of frogs, a camp emerged.

So that’s the history. Here was the reality.

It was 95 degrees. Lori and I drove two hours to get there. I spent a lot of time under a tent, talked with about 200 people, drove 2 hours home, and slept for 9.5 hours. It was utterly exhausting but entirely worth it..

One of the gifts of serving a large community is that you have a multitude of friends you’ve never met. And on special occasions, you get to talk with them.

You get to relive memories you didn’t know they shared. You get to meet families and learn names. Maybe you get to tell someone you love them. Maybe you learn you’ve made a difference.

Maybe they get to see that I don’t handle sun so well.

I’ve been part of this community for 21 years. My membership is old enough to drink, and hopefully wise enough to choose not to. And in that time I’ve had moments where I felt loved and appreciated, and moments when I’ve felt abandoned and alone. I’ve been joyous, angry, proud, repentant, inspired, baffled, and hopeful. This is what it is to do life in community.

As our founder has said many times over the years, your membership doesn’t begin until you are offended and choose to come back. I have been. And I have so chosen. This is part of what I call the inevitable friction of relationship. The key is to keep coming back.

That is something I didn’t do in my youth. And I had a lot of broken relationships to show for it. Giving people grace, and loving them enough to reconcile, goes a long way.

Here were two crystalizing moments in the picnic.

First, on our way out, as we started the long trek to the parking lot, we crossed paths with park transportation, a kids trolley that consisted of a man driving a car with a bunch of caterpillar style seats behind it. It was a great relief option with built in shame. If you felt normal walking up to it, you felt huge once you got in. If this was a plane, I’d be buying two seats out of consideration for other passengers. Lori was sure we would blow a tire.

But that wasn’t the worst part.

The worst part is that the train moved at roughly three miles an hour. So people on foot would see you on it, and wave. And you’d wave. And then you were adjacent to them for _way_ too long. We couldn’t quite hold a conversation, but we were eye to eye long enough for me to question why they were on foot and I was riding.

Second, while we were on our way out, our friend Yvette said we were now travelling to Capernaum, a reference to the distance between Jesus’s hometown in Nazareth, and headquarters in Capernaum which was a 9.5 hour walk.

And her husband, Richie, said: “there are no flip-flops in Capernaum.”

And sure, this is husband and wife banter. And both of them have jokes.

But I’ve been thinking about it ever since.

We often think our trials are epic. We think that our suffering is unprecedented and world-ending. But at the same time, literally, figuratively, or symbolically, we’re wearing flip-flops. And life in flip-flops can’t be that serious. As comedian Demetri Martin says “I think that when you get dressed in the morning, sometimes you're really making a decision about your behavior for the day. Like if you put on flipflops, you're saying: 'Hope I don't get chased today.' 'Be nice to people in sneakers.'” And I always try to be nice to people in sneakers. But the very presence of flip-flops reminds me that things are not that serious. Life could be a lot worse.

We also confuse our past with our present. Maybe you used to be shoeless, but that season is over. Maybe you once had no options for life’s journeys but now you do.

Today, I’m grateful, not just that I had a good day, but that I’ve had a good life. Despite every trial I’ve endured, every loss I’ve mourned, everything I don’t have or feel like I should, I’m still here, and still privileged to do life with people who hurt my feelings, and drive me crazy, and love me. And I get to do the same for them.

Saturday, I joined 1400 people for a picnic.

Today I’m glad I did.

Stay cool.

(Photo Credit: Tamba)