Issue link: http://cp.revolio.com/i/695454
WheelsOfGrace.com June/July 2016 39 communica on breakdowns, or someone gets lost, and someone else unexpectedly leaves town. Over and over. I could feel heaven closing in on me, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't move, I couldn't sin! I was in a prison of obedience. But had I done anything wrong? My mind raced, knowing a thought becomes an ac on, an ac on a behavior, and then behavior becomes a habit. And the chains of habit are too light to be felt, un l they are too heavy to be broken. I've got 24 hours le here Lord, what is it you want me to see, to bring home, and to leave for others? Everyone else has a ride…. I just have a camera. I looked up and saw a man standing just inside a vendor's tent. He didn't belong. He might have been labeled homeless by the standard we are used to seeing. He was as old as dirt, there was a far off empty gaze in his eyes, and with no connec on to the outside world he stood as s ll as a statue. An obvious local, with a fair chance for capitol gain just for rally week. I wondered how he had survived otherwise. His sign read, 'T-shirts 3 for $29.00. I felt an impression in my spirit. "I want you to see the beauty and love that I am, in how I long for them to receive it. In seeing others as I do, you see my love for them, in all things, everywhere." All external s muli stood s ll as this man appeared to me as the world's most beau ful gem. It happened again, moments later when I came face to face at a stop light with a young, corn fed Midwestern family in an old beat up truck. The mother could have been my teenage daughter, with the baby on the seat between them, and cracks throughout the en re windshield, I saw something unexplainable in her smile, as our eyes met, and like volcanic compassion, the erup on overwhelmed me. These moments reoccurred con nuously for the rest of my visit. I found myself laughing hysterically on the street with strangers, who turned out to be nothing strange at all, but each of them a unique collec ve s tch, in this colorful quilted rally. I witnessed several groups of Biker Ministries who had known this all along, and marveled at their reverence to passion for the crowds. Running along sidewalks, I strained to get just the right feel in a photograph of the life size crosses that were traveling in procession with "The Hellfighters Ministries" as they made their way up and down the street, loving on all that were present. All this goodwill needed to catapult itself towards the one person who was instrument for my lesson. Even though I struggled, I knew I would not be able to bring those tormen ng emo ons home with me. In a blur, a ta oo passed by me, eye level, on a shoulder of a man who towered above me. A cross and a verse. I reached thru the crowd but he was gone. So I dodged up a few yards un l I spo ed that shoulder, grabbed onto it, and said, "Quick can you tell me that verse?" He turned and said, "All I endure once and for all through His strength with Christ" Wisdom, spoon-fed by a biker, on the streets of Sturgis, South Dakota. Each moment I was open to receiving the gi of God's omnipotent presence, created a freedom to walk in love no ma er what was happening around me. His love for all showed up in beauty everywhere I looked. And not just in the ta oos. In the volunteers at the photographic towers, in the woman who sold sodas right out of her fridge, in the ministries handing Bibles at their available parking lots, in the niest details of this biker celebra on, and even in biker fashion. Just don't ask to see me at 'Burning Man' this year; it's more likely you'll find me coaching for Special Olympics. Jill Naumann