Slow down, be present and have something to give away

Mark Greenwood shares how a simple hotel check-in became a reminder to leave a little bit of Jesus wherever we go

I had just arrived at my hotel for a full weekend of ministry and I was feeling a little tired. It wasn’t from the drive down — though that had taken a little longer than expected — it was due to about a month’s worth of busyness in one of those seasons of life. I’ll get booked in and then just chill for a bit, I thought to myself.

“Checking in, sir?” the lovely receptionist asked me.

“Yes please, my name is Mark Greenwood.”

“Are you here on holiday?”

“No,” I replied, “here for work.”

“What do you do?” she asked.

I have a few different ways of explaining what I do to people who aren’t from church. “I’m here speaking at a conference to help Christians get better at helping people explore faith.”

“Oh, that’s interesting,” she said, “I’ve never heard of that before.”

I had just finished explaining and she began to open up about how she had been married to somebody who was a very committed Catholic, and that she had had some bad experiences.

“You know what it’s like,” she said, “you give your heart to these things, it hurts when you feel you get let down.”

I apologised to her and from that moment we began to have a really lovely conversation — I felt the Lord had used me to bring some healing to her as we laughed. I gave her one of my “Is it possible…?” leaflets which I always keep with me. It introduces someone to Big Yes, Little Yes, Healthy Maybe which is all about the journey of faith.

A little bit later, I was meeting some Christians in the hotel lobby coffee shop and she passed by. I called her over and introduced her to them; they were really nice. As she left her shift, she came over to me and thanked me for spending time with her. She later contacted me through the details on the leaflet, thanking me again for spending time with her. She said that she would love to come and hear me tell some of my stories when I was next speaking in the area.

One of my regular prayers is, “Lord help me leave a little bit of Jesus wherever I go. Lord lead me to help someone on the journey of faith.” My aim is that by meeting somebody, making them feel happy and by them knowing I am a follower of Jesus, they might become at least a “Healthy Maybe” about God, Christianity or the church — that is, to become open-minded.

I’m inspired by John 4:6 which says: “Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well.” He was also hungry because the disciples had gone to buy food, and he was thirsty because he asked the lady at the well for a drink. In this moment of human weakness, he has his most fruitful conversation with any individual person in the whole of his recorded ministry — with a woman at a well. As a result, she invited her fellow Samaritans to, “Come and see a man who told me everything I ever did.”

Many Samaritans believed because of her testimony, while a group of them said, “We now believe, not just because of your testimony, but because we have seen for ourselves that this man really is the Saviour of the world.” This happened because they asked Jesus to “stay with them”, which he did for two days. I would love to have heard their conversations.

Out of a moment in Jesus’ tiredness, hunger and thirst, came a beautiful story of impact. It wasn’t a “missional strategy” that tired him even more — I love it!

I’m freshly inspired to believe that by slowing down the pace of life and learning to be present (even when we’re tired) we will discover where God is at work. I think we need to move slowly to catch what the Spirit is doing. Let’s always make sure we have something we can give away to people, too.

Why not buy ten of my “Is it possible…?” leaflets so that you always have something you can give away?

This article first appeared in Direction Magazine. For further details, please click here.