The Deacon's Bench - April, 2011

You never know when you’ll be called upon to do something big. Let me tell you a little story about that.

Next Monday’s the Boston Marathon, and I’ll be heading up to Hopkinton, MA again as I have for several years now. I don’t run in the marathon (that would be suicidal), but about thirty of us ham radio operators help people park cars, figure out where to go and respond to the occasional emergency.

A couple of years ago it was raining as I left home. The rain got worse and worse as I got closer to Hopkinton, and by the time I got there, a full-blown nor’easter was howling along the entire race route.

The way the marathon usually works is that all the runners gather first in the Athlete’s village, which is on the sports fields at Hopkinton High School. The wheelchair racers start first. Then the elite runners are called, followed by the First Wave (serious runners) and Second Wave (people like me).

It was so rainy though, that the officials herded everyone into the high school. I was stationed at the gym, by the door through which everyone came in or went out. After a while, I got a message to have a Boston Athletic Club person start sending people to the corrals, out of which they begin to run the race. I asked how I’d know who a BAC person was and was told they wore distinctive yellow jackets.

There was only one such individual in sight, so I walked up and gave him the message. I was met with a blank stare. I repeated the message, but there was still no response – just a pained kind of look on the man’s face. Then he said “Ich spreche nur ein bisschen englisch,” and I realized that we had a big problem on our hands. I called it back in, and after hearing some distressed, muffled mumbling on the other end of the radio, the dispatcher said “Then YOU start the race.”

Me? Start the Boston Marathon? Well, OK. I can do that. So I commandeered a couple of bemused policemen and off we went, hollering for folks to head on down to the corrals, wishing them well. I watched in awe as several thousand people followed our orders and marched off into the rain.

You could’ve done that too. Anybody could’ve. No question.

I was telling this story to God the other day, and he seemed to take enjoy hearing it.
“How would you like to be involved in getting something much bigger under way, Tim?”
I asked God what he meant.
“I’d like you to help people to come to know and love me.”

I told God I wasn’t sure I could do that. I didn’t know how.
“There’s nothing you have to know, Tim,” God said, “and the less you think you know, the better. All you really have to do is show up, smile and let me work through you. What was it that St. Francis of Assisi said ‘Preach always - if necessary, use words.’ I’ll take care of the details – all I want you to do is to move out and start the race. You can do that, Tim. Anyone can. No question.”

Deacon Tim’s Secret Fish Recipe #12

1 dead but not rotten fish
Secret sauce recipe: 1 tbsp mayonnaise, ½ tbsp sour cream, juice of ½ lime, pinch herbs be Provence. Mix.
Cook fish. Make sauce. Put sauce on fish. Eat.