Amber and the "Second Space"

“In terms of the world’s sanity, Jesus is crazy as a coot, and anybody who thinks he (or she) can follow him without being a little crazy too is laboring less under a cross than under a delusion.”
~Frederick Buechner

Yesterday, while we were to be singing at “church” I leaned over to my daughter Amber and shared with her (while she, the drummer was tapping incessantly the beat of the songs as she can’t help doing now) what Erwin McManus shard last Thursday at Bethel University during his talk with all of us there about his daughter. Erwin spoke of his daughter’s musical giftedness and yet in spite of that she never quite was able to fit in at “church” or be selected for musical activities in that arena.

Erwin’s daughter then moved into the “second space” - of the world, the unfamiliar realm outside of the comfort and familiarity of the “church” – outside of a place where we spend much of our time “blinding each other with our lights” and in the process become increasingly irrelevant to the kingdom and the gospel. As a result of Erwin’s daughter moving into the “second space” with her strength and giftedness she is now performing in all the major clubs in Los Angeles.

Amber really related to this story. I could tell that the, “meaning, story and beauty” of it was not lost on her imagination. Amber said to me, “that is how you have more influence…” and she profoundly understood the relevance of all this. There is much more to be gained by demonstrating your giftedness and talent in the world, the “second space” than in the confines of where we are familiar and are constrained by the limitations we ourselves or others place on our lives.

I put my arm around Amber and told her that “you get it” – you get what probably 90% of the people in “church” on a Sunday morning have no conception of. I told her that “church” on Sunday morning is “nice” and “safe” but she grasped intuitively at seventeen what is real and alive, even if it may seem “crazy or risky” at times. The living a life without fear or doubt is full with meaning and is what is beautiful like her inside and out.

Talking with Amber for what seemed like a very short time, a few fleeting moments of life that is forever “slipping through my fingers” was the most profound thing that could be experienced on this Sunday morning. God is full of surprises and is good in ways and at time when you least expect it.