I Should Be Working
Grace stood in front of the vending machine and stared hungrily at the buttons lined up on the right side displaying her choices. The sun had somehow become permanently enmeshed in her tousled black hair, and she couldn’t remember what it felt like to not have little beads of sweat running down her face. Her feet were dirty from the loose pieces of dust and grime all over the road, and she knew that once she got home, she’d never wear these sandals again. She considered her choices: Pepsi, Pepsi, Pepsi, Pepsi, 7-Up, 7-Up, or some kind of Mexican grape concoction she couldn’t read. In her pocket, she jingled the pesos and the bills, enough to buy 5 cases of soda if she wished. Her other hand rested on the backpack slung over one shoulder and she could feel just barely the half-empty bottle of lukewarm water in her bag. She was alone in the middle of an empty street and all she could think of was cold, sweet, carbonated something sliding down her throat. But that was fifteen minutes ago, fifteen minutes of standing in the same spot wrestling with what she would later describe as “a stupid academic argument”, and still later in her life as “the first time I ever doubted being a Christian.” No one would miss the few pesos it would take to quench her thirst. The money, in fact, had been doled out equally to each member of the team as “spending money” and she knew there would be no accounting of how it was spent at the end of the trip. But neither could she erase from her mind the face of Mrs. Lee, her mother’s friend and a 76 year-old grandmother who had tearfully pressed ten dollars into her hand the day the missions team was presented to the congregation. With a squeeze of her hand and a mumbled promise to pray for her, Mrs. Lee was gone, but her image popped up in her mind every time she tried to buy something. More than anyone else, she unwittingly reminded Grace that this money was in fact, not hers.
The theme of their training period had been based on Romans 12:1. “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship.” She had taken that verse to heart, and in the weeks leading up to the trip, had managed to cut out TV, shopping, and Britney. She realized that her humor was based largely on making fun of people, and stopped making jokes. A few times, she spoke to random people on the subway, intending, but never quite succeeding in sharing the gospel. Even before she came to Mexico, she had felt burdened by the idea of being a living sacrifice. How do you stop living for yourself when it’s what you’ve been doing your whole life? How do you not choose your own happiness? And it was this question that prevented her from putting the coins into the machine. On the one hand, she nagged at herself for being so silly. It was just a soda, after all. On the other hand, she had water in her bag to quench her thirst, and what would Mrs. Lee think if she knew that the money she donated to help the poor unsaved folk in Mexico was instead going right to Grace’s stomach?
“But Mrs. Lee wouldn’t mind. She’d understand.”
“Who cares about Mrs. Lee? HELLO. Do you understand the meaning of the word sacrifice?”
“It’s just a soda.”
“It’s not just a soda.”
“God’s happy when I’m happy.”
“Not always.”
And on and on she went back and forth in her head. It wasn’t like her to spend this long on any kind of decision, but she was strangely fearful of making the wrong choice, as if this decision were going to have great and cosmic repercussions for the world as well as her own life. And she desperately wanted to find herself in a larger world.
Grace looked down at her watch, and knew she had to leave soon to meet the rest of the team. She took a deep breath and summoned all her energy to do the one thing she knew would solve this dilemma. She stopped thinking. It was not the best solution, and in fact, had gotten her in trouble more often than not, but it was without question, effective. Shutting out any thought that dared enter her brain, she took a step back from the machine and paused. Then she pulled out the exact change that her hand had set aside of its own accord, and dropped them into the coin slot. She pushed the 7-Up button and the machine gurgled and rumbled and spit out its product. She reached down to pick out her prize. The can was warm to the touch. A tear sprang to her eye as she picked up the soda and opened it. The warm, bubbly liquid burned her throat as she began the long walk back to the church.
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