The Record of Christians

So, I'm in Baltimore, and I just got finished speaking to an amazing group of senior high and junior high students.

Throughout the week I was loosely encouraging those who were already Christians on what I had learned about apologetics in 2008... That is a fancy way of saying I used what I know of Tim Keller's book "Reason for God" to encourage them on interacting with people who have these blocks between them and the Lord like - Suffering, the Exclusive Claims of Christianity, etc.

One of the hardest ones to deal with is the Record of Christians...

So, on the cab ride home from Dinner (which couldn't have lasted more than 10 minutes), I was interrogated by a poor 72 year old Jewish man who was beat up repeatedly in school because "Jews killed Jesus"... I think I got a semi-free pass for not being Catholic. At the end he said, "Well, someone needs to ask forgiveness for all that..." and I leaned forward and I asked his forgiveness, and he granted it - said he wasn't talking about me (to which I said I was in that tradition so I was asking anyway) - and he thanked me... And I upped my tip...

Then he came back to give me money back because he remembered that our first stop was for him to get gas...

We re-lived both the forgiveness and the tip again.

I suppose Tim Keller is right. I suppose I was right to encourage the kids to simply apologize and offer forgiveness when and where we can... Being right doesn't make me any less sad that this poor man had to fight many days of his elementary school and junior high years. I wonder if I could have talked to him about Jesus if he hadn't been beat up so much when he was young.