Last weekend, my church outfitted apartments for Afghan refugees who were moving into town. Couches, beds, dining room tables, hand towels, clothing—we tried to make a house a home. On Monday morning, I stopped by to meet one of the families. Because I don’t speak their native language of Pashto, I was glad to have a translator on hand.
“My name is Hasjib. This is Nassar.”
“Very nice to meet you, my name is David.” I patted my hand against my chest. “David.”
The reason I stopped by was just to say hello, but while there I discovered they didn’t know how to use their coffee maker. When the translator asked if I could show them the ropes, I was sure I could.
They had a bag of ground Dunkin Donuts dark roast. I wondered if they knew that in drinking this liquid gold, they were New England locals now. I put up two fingers and poured two scoops of grounds into a filter. Then I showed them how to put the filter into the top of the coffee maker. I pointed to the half-point marker on the side of the pot. “Fill the pot to here.” The translator translated. I smiled. They smiled. I felt like we were getting somewhere.
I poured in the water and hit the “On” button. Within a couple minutes, the smell of coffee filled the air, while the coffee itself filled the counter! It was pouring down into everything but the pot! What had I done wrong? I waved my hands in the air and laughed a little, as if trying to shrug off the mess I’d just made, as if trying to assure my new friends, don’t worry, this happens all the time. I started the whole process over again. Sadly, my second attempt went worse than my first.
I decided I needed to call for back-up. I dialed up two friends, Lea and Arlen, who were nearby putting the finishing touches on another apartment. “I need help, can you come?” I probably sounded like someone was dying. But Afghani people love their coffee, and I was wasting what precious little of it they had. “Do you know how to make a pot of coffee?”
“I think so,” Lea said.
Standing around in the kitchen staring at the coffee maker was now Lea, Arlen, me, Hasjib, and Nassar. Lea took the scoop in hand and read the directions (something I had not thought to do before!). “Three times the charm,” I said. Or not.
We never did get the coffee maker to work that day. (Later on we would discover a manufacturing defect in the coffee pot lid, causing the coffee to drip onto the lid instead of through it.) Turning to Hasjib, I lamented, “I’m sorry, we don’t know how to fix this.” On the one hand, it was just a coffee maker, meant to make a simple cup of coffee. No big deal. Nassar and his family had fled their home and country for fear of their lives. They’d traveled thousands of miles on foot, in the back of a truck, on an airplane, to now arrive in a town with warm beds and couches to call their own. On the other hand, they’d suffered hell to arrive in a place where their one hopeful request on the day was for a cup of coffee. “I’m sorry, we don’t know how to fix this.”
Hasjib translated the bad news to Nassar. In return, Nassar said something we of course couldn’t make out, but which I’ll never forget. “He wants to know if you’d like to stay for lunch.” Arlen, Lea, and I all looked at each other. Huh? We’d seen the inside of the refrigerator. There wasn’t a lot in there. As for the counters, all they had to show for themselves was some spilt coffee. After three tries, we had not been able to find a way to get it in the pot.
We live in a world where not everything can always be fixed. Why we think this means we don’t deserve a seat at the table, I’ll never know. After all, God’s word famously declares, “God prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies, and our cup overflows.”
In the final analysis, God’s standard is not a world where all the pieces fit together just perfectly. For God knows firsthand what it feels like to have no home, and to bear a cross. Still, when the coffee has gone everywhere, God asks, “Would you like to stay for lunch?” Should we have the faith and courage not only to say yes, but also to extend the invitation to others, we will see the grace and mercy which comes from having a cup (or pot!) that overflows.
PleaseGrace 