Hank Williams Moments
One summer day, I was getting a ride home in my own car from the repair shop where my beloved Saab would be spending the next few days. The windows were down, Hank Williams was playing and Cliff, the balding, sixty-something, married patriarch of the family that owns the shop, was driving. Cliff was really diggin’ the Hank Williams CD, so we started singing along and talking about the words. Eventually, I said, “To hear Hank tell it, men are sure a lot more hung up on women than we’d ever imagine.” Cliff replied, “That’s probably true since men are so much needier than women.” Well! It was a good thing Cliff was driving because I almost fell out of my seat. That candid, revelatory comment was completely unexpected.
So now I call those moments – moments when out of the blue someone tells me something deeply personal, emotional and revelatory – Hank Williams moments. Although I sometimes experience Hank Williams moments with women, I associate those moments with men, because, in our culture, it is from men that we do not expect these remarks. These moments occur in my life relatively frequently, so they shouldn’t surprise me, but they usually do. There is nothing I can do to make these moments occur. They just happen when I’m occupied with something else, usually a quotidian activity, like cooking, walking or driving.
To me, Hank Williams moments are metaphors for how God enters our lives. I do a fair amount of work, both internal and external, to create a safe and open space for people to be entirely candid, authentic and genuine with me. Even so, I am almost always startled when Hank Williams moments actually occur. Likewise, I try to live a life that is constantly open and vulnerable to God’s revelation, yet I am genuinely stunned when the Holy Spirit actually descends into my heart.
