Tom was very open about sharing his faith, and I admired the fact that he was true to himself and God. The thing about Mr. Osborne was, he was very honest. I really appreciated this, but I think I was a little let down by some things he said. Like about why he does nice things for people.
"Brotherly kindness," yep.
"Servanthood," totally with you, man.
"I almost always have to deal with reluctance to do what I know I need to do," he admitted. "There's a certain understandable element of human reluctance to be a servant, and you will not lose this. But, with practice, you will be able to overcome it."
I feel that. I feel it every Saturday morning when I'm trying to peel myself out of my warm bed to go to the soup kitchen. Here's where Tom and I diverge:
He said his church is very involved with Kairos prison ministry, where they go and fellowship with the inmates. "Whether or not we succeeded in accomplishing our spiritual goals with these inmates, we all left with a blessing," he said, adding that it got to the point where they had to get their "Kairos fix." I guess this doesn't sit right with me because, up until now, I've heard that volunteerism should be about who you're serving, not about how it makes you feel. I think I have to take issue with the whole "accomplishing spiritual goals" thing too. I'm assuming that, by that, he means seeing the inmates accept Christ. But if his goal was just to share the love of Christ as it should be (in my opinion), he should be accomplishing that no matter what response he gets from the inmates. Something about his word choice just makes me think he sees the inmates as a catalyst for a spiritual high. Maybe that was just poor word choice, or maybe Mr. Osborne was just more honest than the others.
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