Finding Momentum

“I called you, Drew, but you didn’t pick up.”

I confess, I tend to ignore Mike’s phone calls. He’ll invariably call me in class or sometimes the call will get dropped instantly when it comes in. I use these as excuses to hang up on him. But it’s mostly because I know what a phone call means (it usually means he needs money).

I’m at the Asian Ghetto (Durant Food Court, to be PC) with Glen on Friday evening when I run into Mike. He’s called me earlier in the night during IV large group and I had to hang up on him because I couldn’t excuse myself. Okay, I didn’t want to take the call either. He left me a voice mail, which I haven’t checked when I see Mike in person a couple hours later.

“Drew, I called you but you didn’t pick up.”

I mumble some sort of apology.

“Listen to this voice mail.” He calls his own number and has me listen to a voice message. A man with a gravelly voice has called Mike and offered him a job as a service assistant to a disabled person. “I meet with him 10AM tomorrow,” Mike tells me with a pained expression on his face.

I’m confused. “That’s good, right?”

“I called you, Drew, but you didn’t pick up. Look man, I need some cash. Last few offers I got I couldn’t do cuz they wanted me to have a car.” He continues to talk about his previous experiences as a health assistant, especially with a disabled family member. “Look man, my family got issues. I can’t depend on them. I come up to Berkeley cuz I know I can depend on people here. I can depend on you college students.”

Sometimes I wish Mike wouldn’t talk so much so I could get a word in edgewise. Sometimes I don’t know what to say. This time, I don’t know what to do.

Depend is the last word I want to hear. I don’t want him to depend on me. It brings up too many bad experiences. It makes me feel like a crutch. It makes me feel used. It brings up questions of codependency I don’t want to consider.

But I give him money. “Look man, I’m doing this cuz you’re my friend. I trust you.” I know he needs the money for bus fare. But it’s tearing me up inside because I wonder if all I am is an ATM machine to Mike.

“Thanks Drew. I love you.” We pray.

Walking back up, I share these thoughts with Glen. He tells me his pastor’s story of offering help to a stranger in need who, in the end, is fleeced. The pastor doesn’t harden his heart, but again gives generously the next time around. For who is he, in light of incredible grace, to claim the right to his money?

I’m not sure I totally agree or understand. But it is comforting at the moment. And who am I, humbled in light of stunning Mercy, to declare myself independent of a broken world?

(His last name is Harris. Michael Harris.)