Please Change

As I was waiting for the 240 bus at Georgia and Granville in downtown Vancouver this evening, a street person walked in front of each transit traveller in our line. As he walked along the edge of the curb, like a gymnast on a balance beam, he looked at us in the eye and asked “please change.” Because we were at a central travel hub in Vancouver, and his bare hands were cupped open, we all understood his question as “please give me some change” though he did not utter the three words in the middle.

But after a few minutes, I thought of his plea as a different request. “You, don’t act in your normal way, please change.” “You, well dressed business-woman, please change. Don’t just be concerned about your busy-ness, be concerned about mine too.” “You, cool, self-focussed teenager, who is on his way home after a night of partying, please change. Can you contribute to my party?” “You, well dressed chaplain, please change. Don’t simply be a bringer of religious gobbledygook – as you were a few hours ago. Please bring true good news, and you can start with me.”

About a minute after he asked me this simple, but penetrating question, I regret how I thought, ‘I don’t need to change as much as you do.’ Thankfully, my mouth is not as fast at expressing what my mind is thinking. But as I sat on the bus, now many miles away from the man who changed the thought pattern of my evening, I realized ‘I am not one who needs change, but I am one who needs to change.’ I need to change to become more caring, I need to change to become poorer in spirit, I need to change to become more like the beggar who asks for small things.

Now these questions linger: How do I need to change? What do I need to change into? Who may be able to help me change? Do I want to become more like the one who asks me to change? Or maybe most importantly, do I need to change at all, or can I watch the change around me and join in it?