Garbage Strikes & CS Lewis
I live in suburban America. Here in suburbia, we have companies that come to our houses on a weekly basis and take our trash away. It’s wonderful. Until the week before Christmas, when the magic stopped. The garbage workers went on strike. Womp womp.
Honestly, it wasn’t worth complaining about. I heard the main issue was the safety of the trucks, which is fair. I was grateful that I didn’t have to sit in countless meetings, negotiate contracts, or deal with complaints. I was grateful that I don’t run a food service company that generates lots of smelly trash. I was grateful I only have one kid in diapers, and not two or three or more.
If you, dear reader, live in a rural area or live in another country, you may not be tracking with me here. You may be asking, “what’s the big deal?”
The big deal, for us, is what didn’t happen. Over the past month, no one dumped trash at the church. Several times a year, people dump trash at the church. One time, someone was in a truck bed and tossed a bunch of trash - while someone else was driving - all around our large grass field. It was trash confetti. Several times, people have dumped demolition garbage next to our church dumpster. Next to, not in. It’s all too common to see trash at our entry.
It’s bad math. Messes take a few minutes to make, but take hours to clean up. When you clean up a mess after a party, at least you got a party out of it. When you clean up a kitchen mess, at least you got a meal out of it. When you have to clean up drive-by-trash-confetti, you just sigh. Hackers mean we pay lots of money on cyber security and multi factor authentication. Thieves mean we pay lots of money on security cameras and insurance policies and locks.
We don’t want to live in a world where people dump their trash for us to clean up. And this reality reminded me of the quote:
“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”
- CS Lewis
Yes, we were made for another world, a beautiful world. This world will be restored. There are touch points where heaven meets earth now (praise God!) but one day there will be a new heaven and a new earth (Rev 21:1-5.) In the meantime, it’s our role as believers in Christ to create beauty, to spread His light amidst the darkness and point to Him.
And as I further reflected on the garbage strike, I noticed how our household trash went from “out of sight, out of mind” to “in sight…oh look…it’s still there.”
This period reminded me how “out of sight, out of mind” so often prevents me from earnestly praying for the lost.
It reminded me to continue to pray for hackers to no longer be drawn to hacking, but to be drawn to holiness. It reminded me that Jesus was right (of course) that the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but He has come so that we may have life and have it to the full (John 10:10.) It reminded me that if we believe God truly hears our prayers, our part is to continue to pray in faith that God would stop people from dumping trash at our church.
It reminded me to pray for the missionaries serving Rohingya refugees, living without access to clean water or sanitation. It reminded me to pray for our missionary friends in Ukraine where war clouds are looming.
May I not take my comforts for granted - like weekly trash pick ups. And more importantly, may I not take the message of salvation for granted.
If you’re searching for hope and want to hear more about Jesus, feel free to check out our Follow Jesus page. Jesus loves you.
P.S. As you may have deduced from the photo, the garbage strike ended last week. Welcome back garbage man. You’ve been missed.
