The Value of Unlikely Relationships

My friendship with Manuel Baez, the pastor of Igelsia Bethania (a small Hispanic church in a poor neighborhood 20 minutes from where I live), has gotten me thinking a lot lately about unlikely relationships. God first made me curious about that neighborhood when I got lost driving through it several years ago. I started going down there, walking the streets, and praying. After I walked past Manuel’s church late one night, I felt that was my point of contact. Everything about the beginning of our friendship was uncomfortable—the language barrier, my feeling out of place in the neighborhood, not knowing if certain things were okay culturally, etc.

Fast forward… today our churches do a huge food pantry together in that neighborhood, and some other ministry things as well. I’m friends with people like Angela, a fifty year old recent immigrant I’ve taught some English to, whose daily challenges are things like how to make sure you get on the right bus to go to WalMart, and how to ask where the laundry detergent is when you get there. But more than anything, it seems that our friendship with Pastor Manuel and his wife Arlyn has been a really big encouragement to them. Friday night Linda and I were over there for a sumptuous dinner of goat and rice and beans (Manuel is from the Dominican Republic and Arlyn is from Puerto Rico). After dinner we got into a long conversation about the culture of their church and what needs to change for it to be more like Jesus and more transformational in people’s lives. God was totally present and guiding the conversation. You see, Hispanic churches that have been around for decades are as stuck as white churches that have been around for decades. At the end of the conversation, before we prayed together, the two of them said they wanted us to know that us coming into their lives was the best thing that has ever happened to them. The best thing? That’s humbling.

You know, when I was first meeting them, there were times I just felt so out of my depth, I started to back away. What if I had? Thank God He didn’t let me. Reflecting on all this has made me wonder if we Christian leaders shouldn’t be a lot more intentional about building what we might call “strategic unlikely relationships”. Do you guys ever think about this? Is it ever something you’ve wanted to do? I’ve been thinking about stopping into a local Muslim congregation I drive by every week. The thought scares the crap out of me. But what if I just stopped in and asked the local Imam if I could by him lunch, and said I was a Christian who doesn’t have any Muslim friends, but I’d like to?

I’m starting to suspect that if we’re willing to enter relationships the Holy Spirit whispers to us about, we don’t need to know where it’s going, we just need to be obedient to the Spirit’s leading. And what I think I’m learning is that when we choose to enter unlikely relationships, it opens up an entirely different category of what we might see God do, and whole new vistas of seeing the Kingdom manifest in this world.