“Your old men shall dream dreams”

How many shoes do you own?

I’ll wager you own a few less shoes than the legendary Imelda Marcos (rumored 3,000 pair in her collection), but more than the impoverished Cinderella.

I am certainly no shoe collector; my shoe wardrobe is sparse compared to many women. But I have way more than two pair of shoes.

Don, the pastor who married my husband and me over 39 years ago (now pastor emeritus and, yes, he’s getting up there), posed a challenge on Pentecost Sunday in a private conversation during coffee hour. Our current interim pastor (and we’ve only had two full-time pastors since Don founded this congregation in 1963) preached a great sermon from Acts 2:17 on having congregational vision and how “your sons and your daughters shall prophesy; your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.”

“I’ll share a vision I have long put before the people of this congregation,” Don said, a slight twinkle in his eyes.

He had my attention. “Oh, what’s that?” Don has also been a member of the same house church as I have been these past 15 or so years. Our congregational structure includes house churches, organized around specific outreach missions in the community. They kind of function like a small group. So I was curious as to whether I’d ever heard this particular vision from him before.

“I have frequently challenged house churches to covenant together to consult with each other any time they think they need more than two pair of shoes.”

I was quite speechless. Two pair of shoes? What did that have to do with your faith? Well, I am certainly no shoe collector; my shoe wardrobe is sparse compared to many women. But I have way more than two pair of shoes.

“Oh, really?” I bit.

“These” (he pointed to the pair on his feet) “are my Sunday and house church shoes” (and any other halfway presentable occasion). “I have one more scrubby pair for the yard and outside work,” he promised.

“I bet Betty has more than two pair of shoes,” I said, referring to his beloved and quick-to-speak-her-mind wife.

“No-o-o-o, she only has two pair also,” he claimed.

I’ve never known Don to be a liar so I took him at his word, and I didn’t think he was joking. All these years and I never noticed, nor had I ever paid particular attention to Betty’s shoes.

And Don’s prophetic dare to the congregation’s covenanting house churches over the years was more a symbolic challenge, a challenge to do with less in one area of your life to help make you conscious of those who truly can only afford one pair of shoes. Or who don’t even have one pair, in some areas of the world. Betty and Don have a lovely older house full of treasured antiques and family mementos, so it’s not that they have gone hippy on us.

Guiltily I thought of my closet: three pair of tennis shoes: one good, one medium, and one ratty. I have several pair of sandals for summer office wear, and dressy shoes with closed toes for winter: flats, clogs, heels in several colors. I have two pair of wearable boots. Probably about 15 pair all together, counting boots. How many do I really need? How would doing with less help others—or me?

Yet here I am two days later still pondering his provocative question and now sharing it with you. I hope it disturbs you as much as it did me.

That’s what I call a good pastor—one who can stir you out of complacency to consider new options for your life, and to take action.

There’s at least one pair of sandals in my closet that I’ve likely only worn four or five times, that I bought on sale on a silly whim. I can at least give them away while they still look new and fashionable. And I can ponder what else in my life I can do without, as well as challenge my church friends and family to look at ways to challenge each other, like Don did during a routine coffee hour at church. Hmm . . . maybe do without that coffee?

What possessions challenge you most? Your car? Your house? Clothes? Maybe you are a shoe diva. What vision do you have for your family or church? Comment at www.thirdway.com/aw or email MelodieD@MennoMedia.org. Or write to Another Way, 1251 Virginia Ave., Harrisonburg, VA 22802.