Remembering ‘Old Joe’ And The Way He Showed Christ In All He Did

I once had a congregation member named “Old Joe.” (Name changed to protect innocent.)

Old Joe was a cantankerous congregation member. He never seemed happy. He always had a criticism. His face was set in a permanent scowl. Even when he was laughing he looked mad. I first met Old Joe on my second Sunday. He came up to me after church and I introduced myself and said, “Sorry, can you tell me your name again?”

Old Joe scowled at me and said, “I wasn’t here last Sunday. I never go to a new preacher’s first service.” I said, sorry I didn’t know, I was trying to remember a bunch of names and faces. Old Joe said, “Don’t worry. You’ll remember me.”

And I do. Oh do I ever. Let me tell you about Old Joe. All his life he had dedicated himself to the service of God. He had led many mission trips. Had sponsored missionaries overseas. He regularly tithed 20 percent of his income. Anytime there was a need in the church he was the first to step up to volunteer. If you’ve ever heard the old phrase that in a church 10 percent of the people do 100 percent of the work. Well Old Joe was the 10 percent. He was a war hero. A great father. A leader in his community and one of the most sincere and hardest working church members I’ve ever had the joy of meeting. But man, was he cantankerous.

One Sunday I had a great idea for a sermon. It was smart. It was ingenious and it was relevant. I used a lot of illustrations about the Crocodile Hunter. I used a bunch of Australian phrases like “Good day, Mate” and “Shelia.” I tied it into the scripture about how the church can tear down multi-racial and language boundaries if we just concentrate on the language of God’s grace. I ended with a prayer using some Australian phrases like “Crickey!” and “Bob’s your uncle!” I was proud of that sermon. I even delivered it well. When I got to a certain point in the sermon, I jumped back like Steve Erwin did and said, “Crickey!”

It was cool. Anyway, after the service was over, I was feeling particularly proud of myself. As I was telling everyone goodbye, person after person told me “good job, pastor.” One of the younger congregational members (she was 65) said it was one of the best sermons she had ever heard. And then came Old Joe. He walked up to me with his scowl and said, “Well. Looks like everyone liked that sermon.” (Which for Old Joe was about the best compliment you could ever get.) I smiled and said thank you but then I had to go a bit too far. I said, “What did you think.”

Old Joe grabbed my hand a little bit tighter, pulled me closer to him so he could whisper and said, “You missed the most important part.” I whispered back, “What was that?” And he said, “You never mentioned Jesus.” And with that he walked away.

I stood there in shock. I was mentally going through my sermon notes. Surely I had mentioned Christ in the sermon somewhere. Was it at the first? Nope. Did I say it with one of the three points? Nope. Surely I had mentioned Jesus during my closing summation? Nope. I gave an entire 20 minute long sermon and through it all, I forgot to mention Christ. Old Joe changed me forever that day. Before I just looked at him as some grumpy old man who never had anything nice to say. But after that I looked at Old Joe differently. He showed Christ in all that he did. To Old Joe, Christ was the only point of a sermon that mattered.