by Joe Steinke with David Shirk

Introduction

Angie and I met David Shirk when we were in our mid thirties. He was a deep soul with crystal blue eyes that seemed to look right through you. After our first conversation, he said something like this; 

“Joe and Angie, I have you in my heart.”

For over the past several decades he’s proven this overture to be true, staging for us the most generous personal hospitality – being held in love, held in life’s troubles and transitions, and of course, held in his heart. 

Some years into our friendship with David, after a visit where we were ruminating about life in ministry and the personal and public challenges it brings to our souls, he wrote an epic exhortation to us. 

Just last year, I celebrated my 60th birthday, hosting an exclusive weekend with friends, and at the evening party-concert, I asked David to read his exhortation aloud to warm the room up with a tone suited for the songs I was about to share with my heart on my sleeve. He opened by saying; 

“I wrote this over 20 years ago, but still believe every word of it.” 

So do I. 

I offer it here, with his permission, as a gift given to all of us who are trying to live an authentic life from the raw core of our true selves in full view of God and a few trusted friends. 

---

Date Stamp: Monday, September 30th, 2002

From: David Shirk

To: Joe & Angie Steinke

the prayer of a minor prophet

I once overheard a man pleading with another and this is what I heard him say…

What is it that makes a message great? What makes a book absorbing, music engaging, or a film compelling? What is it that makes a work of art seize control of your soul? It’s the ‘people’ part of the transaction – the personal disclosure – the touch of humanity. There is little that I receive from your non-personal presentations that I couldn’t get from a book somewhere in the rows of a good library. It’s the ‘you’ part of your revelation, your insight, and your commentary on life that is so rich and valuable to me. I don’t need the uninvested re-gurge of some dead man’s best thinking echoed hollowly through your communication – I can read that for myself. I need for you to tell me what these words have done ( or undone ) in you. At the very least, I need for you to include the pain and experiences or perceptions that he or she passed through in the acquisition of their truth. They purchased that revelation with something very costly, it’s not enough for you to provide a rental version for me.

I don’t need your knowledge by itself either, but I desperately need that knowledge after it’s been pushed through the wet fabric of your own experience. Then your knowledge comes alive to me – it nourishes me – and it becomes words that change the course of my life. Don’t ever take the you out of your message. Don’t you know that real power comes when the man or woman is the message, and the message is the man or the woman. I want to eat the fresh bread from your hand. I know you’re not yet a finished baker. I know your ‘loaves’ are still in the oven, I know they’re sometimes doughy and other times burnt. But today, I’d rather eat imperfections from your hand than the hand of one not here. 

I need to touch your life, your passion, and your essence – for this is the source of your power to me, the inspiration of your art, the execution of your craft, the inkwell of your words. Please be to me someone true, someone honest, someone real, someone alive. Don’t worry about being cool, or perfect, or mature, or holy. I’m not looking for that in you – I’ve already found that in another. Be ‘you’ to me and you’ll seem close to everything that I desire or value. Don’t be afraid that I’ll judge you if you’re real, I never will, I promise. But do be afraid that you’ll lose me if you’re not. Lose me because I’m bored or lose me because I’m angry or lose me because I’m tired of waiting for the real you to come out. 

If people judge you for leaving your cave – for trying to be more real or honest or true – leave them alone, they’re lost in a tunnel darker than your own. However, after a while you won’t feel like forgetting them any longer – you’ll have compassion upon them and love them and see yourself in them – sometime ago. But never go back because of their words, for they have no place to lead you but into the utter darkness of insecurity, pride, and senseless captivity. True freedom must be present for your virtue to flow, and true freedom refuses to show itself unless you’re real, unless you’re authentic. 

Without it I can’t see you in your expressions and everything seems so flat and gray – so one dimensional and without color. It reminds me of the prison from which it must have issued, it reminds me of a people that would destroy their own art. 

I need to recognize the journey. And I need to know that you recognize that it is a journey. When you only speak to me of grand destinations you actually erode my desire to go there. It’s the journey that’s such a vital part. It’s the journey that prepares me to someday arrive – that makes me glad to be there – to not be afraid of such a new and different place. But I don’t want to get there too soon. I want to experience the road trip, I want to enjoy the hike, I want to take a train, or even sometimes crawl. I want the blisters. I’m not afraid of getting lost or being rained on, and it’s ok if I experience poverty and get mugged or run off the road. Yes, it’s definitely ok, it’s all part of the journey, my journey, part of owning where it is that I’m headed. Don’t rent me some guide to give me oxygen so I can vainly boast about conquering some great summit. Instead, make my thighs ache and my lungs burn, and never, ever try to climb it for me. And for sure don’t tell me there’s no pain in the journey – tell me I’ll probably die, but I’ll love it because I’m alive at last! And don’t forget to tell me how it’s killing you. 

Be honest with me – share something of yourself in your words. Comfort me. Tell me that I’m not alone on this journey, that invisible hands are leading me, tell me it’s grace that keeps pushing me in the back. Remind me that I don’t have to get it all right to still make it.  Tell me stories of weaker men and women than I who have gone before me – tell me how they made it. Assure me that it’s ok to rest or wander or take my time – tell me that I won’t fall behind if I stop to measure the sunset, to smell the sky, to put my hands in the earth, or to look for love . And in the end, don’t ever stop pleading with me to keep going – to not turn back and look for some easier road.