Listening to an astronaut on NPR telling about his spacewalk to replace an app. Traveling at 17,000 mph, he described going into the dark side of the cycle. Cold and the darkest of dark. Not much to hang onto. He said he wasn’t worried about the tether. It was his heart he was concerned about.

“Don’t look down!”

The app was covered by a plate held in place by 117 small screws with tiny washers. He found that plate was covered by another plate with several screws one of which had been stripped. It is not like he could take off his glove and pull the screw out with fingernails. He rode the orbiter through the dark-cold side and was instructed to use duct tape to get the resistant screw. Millions spent on tools and they needed duct tape. Worked!

The team had practiced for years to get those screws out. At 150 miles above the earth, he readied himself to remove the first of 117 screws and found the cordless drill battery was dead.

The astronaut said one feeling dominated him through that spacewalk: how alone he was. Even after he got back to earth, he felt that memory of “alone.” I may pass out just thinking about the aloneness of being outside the spacecraft in space.

I know people who feel that alone. Let me repeat my mantra—Where do you advertise for a friend? Not just another body, but someone who “gets” you and know they are for you even when they don’t understand everything you’re saying, feeling, planning or wanting.

One of my pastors said on the Lord’s Day, “The church is the world’s only hope. God has no Plan B.” I didn’t want to start an argument, I just wanted to hear strategies. Of course, we need people to sit by bedsides, but we desperately need people who will walk alongside the creatives and the “cut loose”. If the church has no strategy or stomach for that….

The Quest House—the community you’ve always wanted. We have room at the “house.” The power of “with me,” “let us,” “together.” (See Psalm 34:3.)

I’m going to go charge my drill.

©2015 D. Dean Benton—www.bentonministries.com