Last Saturday morning I had breakfast with my friend Skip at the International House of Pancakes. We get together every few months to visit and have some "interfaith dialogue."
Skip is a "spiritual practitioner" by his own definition. He has given me permission to write about our friendship and our conversations together.
Skip is about 40 years old, bright, thoughtful and articulate. He is near the end of a 20-something-year career in the United States Marine Corps. (Once he was a boot camp drill sergeant.)
Raised in Oklahoma, Skip was exposed to the gospel as a child. His grandfather was a Nazarene pastor. And Skip, like almost everybody, is fascinated by Jesus. He quotes Jesus to me.
But Skip is a sampler of the "spiritual buffet." He takes a little from Christianity, more from Buddhism and Hinduism, and a lot from current writers like Eckhart Tolle and Deepak Chopra. When I mentioned that his faith is a "spiritual buffet," Skip strongly agreed. He sees that as a good thing.
He encouraged me to read a book by Bernadette Roberts, a former nun and Christian mystic. I bought her book "What Is Self?: A Study of the Spiritual Journey in Terms of Consciousness". Her writing is so dense that I hardly got past the preface.
Skip is not going to convert me. After 44 years as a follower of Jesus, I am more convinced than ever that Jesus is God, and that His death and resurrection are the hinge of history. I have the opportunity, time after time, to present the claims of Jesus as Skip and I visit together.
But Skip likes to talk with me. I really do want to understand him. My faith in Jesus is strengthened by our conversation. And, surprisingly, when it comes to life, there are a lot of things on which we agree. I look forward to our next conversation, and I pray for Skip and his family.
My hope for Skip (as I have told him) is that he will come to put his trust in Jesus. But in the meantime, I want him to know that I care.
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