Back to what I might call my flesh
Let your mind go back to the beginning of this lesson, the part where I spoke of my life in automatic, near fisticuffs. On the road behind Baldwin Brook drive was a street Google tells me was named Malabar Road. Google may remind me of road names, but my memory tells of people names. On Malabar Road there lived a fellow one year my senior named Brad Nederveldt1. I think he is deceased, but he has forever lived in my mind as a friend. I think he was a friend because he was a peacemaker.
Brad was a fellow who naturally got along with others, including me. He was an easy fit with that driveway-fellow. He was an easy fit with me. If the three of us were together then things would work. We were 12 or 13 years old so I think it was reflex, nature, not some thought out approach to people.
Dungeons & Dragons anyone?
I have told you of John and Brad. There was another fellow name Johnny Whittenberg. He lived on Norwich Drive one street the other direction from Malabar. He was the son of the principal at Calvary Christian Academy where the two of us went, and important to this story a closet Dungeons and Dragons (we would call it D&D way back when) fan.
He and I had an uneasy acquaintance, but at least it was not like John up my road. Thing is, I mentioned that he played D&D to someone who wrote a letter to the boy’s father, the principal. Guess what? I was immediately persona non grata and that uneasy acquaintance devolved into a hateful one. I am curious to know whether that letter saved that fellow some as yet undivulged badness. That is one of those things I expect only heaven will (maybe) reveal.
Brad, the peacemaker
After that event, my existence in the neighborhood and school shifted from already shaky ground with friends to a much messier one.
Brad has a key role in this, and one I cannot forget. In and of itself it probably is not so good, but it helped. It helped a lot. He came up with some violent persona for me even drawing a switchblade on my baseball glove. (The dim pen marks are still on that glove today.) Somehow, someway that action on Brad’s part changed the interactions among us boys.
One last story and this one is about baseball cards. I started collecting those cards in 1983 and would trade in the surrounding neighborhoods. At the outset, I knew little about card value, and some fellow in a neighborhood to the southeast (I cannot remember more than that but I did have to ride through some undeveloped strip of land to get there) traded a George Brett card for some nothing card. He swindled me. Brad pointed out that I had been swindled; pre-teens can feel the swindle acutely. Brad said, “I’ll get that card back for you.” I don’t know exactly how he did it, but I think he took some of his cards, traded with that boy and got my George Brett card back. (Today I have three of those in three complete sets Topps 1983, card #600; one of them is that card.)
I best understand God when I can see things from my existence. Brad was just Brad and it made a difference. Jesus is Jesus and he is the same way. Now the Holy Spirit works in us as Jesus did during his earth days. People have real problems, and it is not just between us and God. It is between us and our fellows. God wants to fix these fractures. He paid a big price to be able to. I don’t know if you have any Brads in your life. You can have Jesus in it.
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