The Interruptions Are the Ministry
Someone came in carrying the weight of habits and stories that didn’t fit the script. The language was raw, the claims interesting— the kind that make you wonder if they wanted to be believed, or if they just wanted someone to stay in the room long enough to listen.
It all happened after the service. And that holds its own kind of weight — the hymns already sung, the prayers already spoken, the polished hour already over. What came next wasn’t clean or scripted. The language was blunt, the presence was real. Human. Honest.
When the question came — “Can we step back outside?” — I said yes. Because sometimes presence doesn’t happen in the sanctuary. Sometimes it happens on the steps, away from the doors they feared might close in their face.
I shook a hand. I asked a name and offered mine. And then I listened — for fifteen, maybe twenty minutes. Not forever. Boundaries matter. But long enough for the voice in front of me to matter, too.
I didn’t have answers, and I couldn’t change the situation. But I could be present. I could try to step inside their shoes long enough to feel what it was like to carry that weight. Empathy wasn’t everything, but it was what I had to give.
It was the kind of life story churches struggle to know what to do with. The edges don’t fit the script. The weight carried comes with stories of rejection, with battles most pews never talk about out loud. The kind of struggles that make polite people nervous, the kind that usually get whispered about — or ignored.
I didn’t have the answers, but that wasn’t what was asked for. Not acceptance policies, not legal advice, not clean explanations. They literally asked to be heard.
And so I listened. I didn’t fix the story, didn’t edit the words, didn’t erase the jaggedness of the reality in front of me. I listened.
The truth is, I’m not sure anyone inside would have had that conversation. Not because they’re cruel, but because modern church culture isn’t built to hold this kind of mess in the daylight. That’s the ache I carried after.
Because mercy doesn’t wait for the right vocabulary, mercy doesn’t flinch at a rap sheet, a raw edge, or a body that doesn’t match expectations. Mercy doesn’t need polish. Mercy just shows up, shakes a hand, trades names, and gives twenty minutes to a voice that refuses to be erased.
And this is the call of the church. Not the building, not the programs, not the polished services — but the body of Christ. The body that steps outside, takes a hand, trades names, and listens long enough for a person to know they matter.
It’s what Jesus calls us to do, even when it shows up at the door unexpectedly. And that’s just it. That’s the posture we need — to expect the interruptions and to stop seeing them as interruptions, but rather to see them as what they are,connections and the opportunity for real ministry. To be ready for the raw edges and the stories that don’t fit the script.
They literally asked to be heard.
So I tried.
Sometimes that’s the sermon.
It’s hard. It’s messy. It’s inconvenient. It’s ministry. And if it can’t show up at the church, then where?

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