“Wake Up Kids! We got the Dreamer’s disease!” sing the New Radicals in one of my favorite songs.
I certainly do. I remain a kid at heart. This time of year I wear socks because its cold and I am forever getting a running start, suddenly stopping and gliding across the tile floor in my house. If I wore underwear I would look like Tom Cruise in whatever movie that was but I don’t so no one will mistake me for him.
And I have a serious case of the Dreamer’s Disease!
There is no cure.
Not that I would want one. I’ve been part of a lot of incredible accomplishments, traveled the world, know who my friends are (and who they’re not), and am preparing myself for the next great thing. That’s what dreamers do. We’re always getting ready for the next great thing; be it love, justice, creation, art, or random acts of … everything!
I showed up for bar church yesterday, dressed to preach wearing shorts, a faded blue long sleeve tee with a paint stain on the arm, and an unbuttoned flannel shirt to knock the chill blowing in off the ocean. I got a robe that I bought from a minister who was going out of business but I didn’t want to wear it.
There were lots of people on the sidewalk outside of the Wind Rose Café, which had been masqueraded as a church with a huge banner hanging out front. It read “Tybee Church! Mayberry by the Sea! Smokers and Flip Flops welcome! Where Pirates Worship”!
Making my way through the people on the sidewalk the bar was packed! It was standing room only and it stopped me dead in my tracks. Jenny O walked in. Johnny O followed her. O Johnny was already seated. Whitley must have still been there from the night before because he was on the front row.
Then there were all of these other people. Many are regulars at bar church but then there were lots of others that I recognized. Over the years they were people who had sought me out because I was someone who could get their teeth fixed, find them housing, introduce them to a doctor and take on a hospital.
“Been waiting on this Rev,” yelled Richard who is nine feet tall and tells me he bends nails for a living, meaning he works construction when he can find work and couldn’t drive a nail in straight if his life depended on it.
A lady who was vaguely familiar threw her arms around my neck and hugged the breath out of me. She couldn’t have weighed ninety pounds. Her long brown hair weighed more than she did. She didn’t say anything. She hugged me and I felt wetness in my ear. And then the ocean erupted in my eyes.
Sam Adams and Gordon started playing the music. My friend Joanie got up and did this killer version of “Amazing Grace” which is much better performed in a bar than in a church (and if you don’t believe it then Google John Newton and learn the rest of the song and how it got written).
Then this old familiar feeling started in my stomach and began making its way up. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve felt it but I knew what it was. For 30 years, the Dreamer’s Disease would infect me. Coupled with a kid’s heart it can be lethal.
So I’d kick in the doors of Congress that mostly justify themselves or Baptist Corporate Headquarters who justify who they think God is or the arrogant banks that run/ruin the economy or the Chambers of Commerce where most decisions are actually made. And I would be representing the homeless, people living with AIDS, the uninsured, the addicted, the unsteady and the ones doing the best that they knew how to do.
And I overcompensated on their behalf and was as cocky as a NFL quarterback in a playoff game. And the words of God came rushing into my heart, making their way up to my head, and spewing out of my mouth.
In Seminary I learned this phrase, “orgasmic preaching”. Damn it’s good you hit it. It is not arrogance or cockiness but there is this moment when you know with everything in you are God’s words and not yours and you couldn’t change them or influence them if you wanted to.
And just like sex, after that … you are spent. So I meandered around with my friends for a bit. But then I went home where I just needed to bask in the love that I believe God is. And I smiled and when I did.
And I believe that God smiled back.
But then again, I have the Dreamer’s Disease.
And a kid’s heart.
