Easter Dinner at Outback Steakhouse

As per my routine I read the Daily Bread, the Daily Prayer for Peace and recited the Mission Prayer. “God where will your Spirit lead today? Help me be fully awake and ready to respond. Grant me the courage to risk something new and become a blessing of your love and peace. Amen.”

The online celebrations of Easter had ended and it was a beautiful day outside. I went outside and sat on the balcony for the first time this year. I was fully vaccinated and sitting in the sunshine feeling satisfied with the days events. Baseball season had begun and life, it seemed, was beginning at long last to return to something like normal. I felt liberated.

As I was enjoying the sunshine I began to smell my neighbors cooking. It smelled like steak. I hadn’t had a steak in over a year.  I hadn’t been to a sit-down restaurant in over a year. It was the end of the Lenten fast and a day to celebrate, so I headed to the nearby Outback Steakhouse and sat at the bar so I could order a steak and watch the Angels game.

I ordered a Diet Coke as the baseball game between the Angels and the White Sox began. A young man asked if he could sit down sat a couple of seats over and I said: “No problem”. Before long, the Angels pitcher, Shohei Ohtani, who was the second Angels player in the batting order, hit a home-run.  “Oh wow!” I exclaimed.

The young man looked over, so I explained that it was the first time a pitcher had hit that early in the batting order in 113 years and that the home run by a starting pitcher was pretty amazing. He agreed, and that started a conversation.

Before long I discovered he worked in his own construction business. So I asked him what kind of work he did. “Just about everything from the foundation to the roof,” he said. I have a habit of trying to bring the conversation with strangers towards things that matter. So I mentioned that one of the churches I work with just got a new roof and that several of our congregations were damaged in the Derecho storm.

I ordered dinner as did he along with a water. One of the bartenders later brought him an Arnold Palmer (Iced Tea and Lemonade) and said, “your usual?” But he declined it and said he was “cutting back.” They laughed.

So as I had hoped he would, he asked me about my job, “so are you like a building manager for churches?”

“Well, I am an executive minister, I serve 20 congregations in Central Iowa, and, well one of them is in Missouri just over the border.” He got an interested expression on his face.

He said: “I have a friend who does something like that. His name is Vincent Lewis.”

“You know Vince Lewis!” I exclaimed. “He’s retired now, I have his old job for Community of Christ. I just saw Vince this morning on our Easter worship.”

I discovered that this young man had been a student at North High and in the ROTC program. Vince, he said, had been in the Army and served in Vietnam, so while he was principal at North High he often visited the ROTC students and shared stories or insights.

The young man explained that the ROTC instructor of many years had died and that’s where he saw Vince, at the funeral, and in talking with him learned of Vince’s job working with 20 congregations in Iowa, well one is actually in Missouri. This young man, 30 years of age, had served two tours in Afghanistan. I thanked him for his service.

As we continued to share, I mentioned that I had attended Graceland University. “Graceland?” he asked. “I have a friend that works at Graceland. His name is Paul Davis.” It turns out he and Paul frequent the same “bike shop” which I understood to mean motorcycles.

“I saw Paul in our online Easter service, too!” I exclaimed. The young man was surprised to learn that Vince and Paul knew each other.

He didn’t consider himself a religious man. But we discussed life and death and he confessed his awareness brought on by two tours in Afghanistan that life could end at any moment. “Help me be fully awake and ready to respond.”

I’m not sure why that man’s path crossed mine on the evening of Easter. Was it by chance or was it for his benefit or mine? But I am sure that I will return to Outback Steakhouse, order an Arnold Palmer, and hope to strike up a conversation with one of the regulars.

Spiritual Practices for Today

Download or open the Community of Christ app on your smartphone or visit www.cofchrist.org to read today’s Daily Bread and Prayer for Peace.

After reading the Daily Bread article, consider these questions:

In what ways am I separated from God?

How is god extending me grace?

How is God guiding my transformation?

As you listen to the sound of your own breathing, consider the prayer phrase “Jesus, Transform Me.”

Pray: God of Forgiveness and Transformation, help me be alert to those around me. Forgive me for those moments when I ignore those you have set in my path and help me to share my story in a way that helps others. In these days of resurrection and hope, help us to build your peaceable kin-dom here on earth. Amen.

Read Romans 12:2 “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

What word or phrase caught your attention in this passage?

Read the passage again. How is this passage speaking to you today?

Pray the Mission Prayer: God, where will your Spirit lead today? Help me be fully awake and ready to respond. Grant me the courage to risk something new and become a blessing of your love and peace. Amen.

2021 Guiding Question: Are we moving towards Jesus, the peaceful One?

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