"You're a Christian, aren't you?"

I was stunned to hear those words the other day when I was conducting my new ministry as a Front End employee at Weaver Markets in Adamstown, PA.

I was running my cash register on the Ten Items or Less aisle early Saturday morning when, because the rush had not yet begun, I invited a woman with more than ten items to use my aisle.

I said, "Look, there's no one else around.  It's not like you're going to be holding other people up."

And, of course, as soon as she started to unload her cart, another customer with three items came up behind her to await her turn.

I processed the violator of store rules and began processing the second customer's items.  As I was scanning her items, she said it: 

"You're a Christian, aren't you?"  I was stunned and touched and confused.

"Yes.  I am."

Then after saying, "Paper or plastic?" and "Your total is $4.73," I asked, "Why do you say that?"

[Her answer will throttle the many people who say, "I agree with what you say, bill, but I completely disagree with the way you say it.]

"Because you're so sweet."

I stammered, "I'm not really that sweet and if you see any of that in me at all, it's the Lord you're seeing.  You are a Christian too, right?"  I said that because this young lady oozes sweetness.

We then spent a brief moment discussing the difference loving and obeying Jesus makes in a person's life.  The next customer approached.  I said, "Well, have a blessed day," and smiled a smile I couldn't have suppressed if I'd tried.

Sweet?  Me?  She seemed sane.  I promise you.

--------------------

I absolutely L-O-V-E my new ministry. 

Even before I understood that being a pastor these days is nothing more than being a parish priest under a church's or a denomination's brand, I chafed at serving in the priestly role of a clergyman.

In Revelation 1, John says of all disciples that Jesus has made us to be "a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father."

Now that I've repented of the parish priest role, I absolutely love being a member of what the Protestants call the priesthood of all believers.

Two days after the "You're a Christian, aren't you?" comment, one of my managers, a youngish Christian guy, heard me mention the Greek thinker Hypocrites and something Hypocrites asserted that many evangelicals today believe.  He pushed his way into the position that he was bagging at my cash register and said, "Bill's talking philosophy again.  I want to hear this."  And, so we discussed, between customers, the nature of sin and human personality.

I am convinced that I stand out more as a follower of the Way--and I accomplish more as a priest and as a subject of God's kingdom--standing behind a cash register than I ever did standing behind a pulpit. 

And, I never had this sort of a sense of living in the Lord's will when I was being paid to be a parish priest as a member of the Christian clergy.

I think I know now why Paul continued to make tents.  What a blessed way to live!

Soli Deo Gloria!