Notably New York

Yesterday Jackie and I ate lunch at Gray’s Papya.  They sell these buttons – “Polite New Yorker.”  Obviously, I bought one, duh.   As we walked around the city killing time until we went to the taping of The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon, it will come as no surprise to anyone that we engaged in conversations with people everywhere we went.    Almost immediately when we would talk to people they would turn to me and say something like, “So, where are you from?”  I am proud of the fact that I have little to no accent.  And none of them mentioned anything about an accent when they asked me.  No, it was evident that actively engaging with strangers is not typical New Yorker behavior. 

 

God wants us to live alongside people from every age, color, race, ethnicity, language, and worldview in a space where creative expression bursts from the seams of the concrete… where the desire to create is nurtured and valued.  The opportunity to love people, to understand them, to see them, to be loved by them and to move in a rhythm of shared experience

is simply spectacular.  That is realized nowhere else on earthy more acutely than right here in New York City, the city that never sleeps.

It grieves me that most New Yorkers don’t appreciate the valuable resource at hand.  But this dissonance is familiar.  Every day I meet people that don’t recognize the climate of the Kingdom around them.  As my hair blows back in the wind, and my cheeks flush from the radiant heat, they stand still and cold. 

The spirit stirs inside of me; as though I can feel the focused attention of our Creator’s love for the 8 million + presently in my proximity humming within.  It washes over me, and I celebrate.   This city is sacred, and I am thankful I have the opportunity to take my shoes off on this holy ground. 

Revelation 21:23
The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its light.  The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it.  On no day will the gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there.  The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. 

It all belongs to God.  It’s all sacred.  Be reminded it can all be yours too.    May you have eyes to see.  Go on; take the red pill.  You might have to fight an agent or two, but you also just might meet the Savior.

Soundtrack - New York, New York – Frank Sinatra, King of New York – Newsies; God of this City – Bluetree/Chris Tomlin.