As many of you know, I am an analogy person! I love a good, relatable situation or story, when explaining something that is, well....unexplainable. I have had a few people ask me, who was this guy Ken? I posted a journal thought a few days ago about who Ken Moore was to me, but this analogy was the greatest explaination of who he was and who anyone like this is.
I'll start it off this way, I used to be an avid collector of baseball cards, basketball cards and football cards! Avid might be an understatement...I have a closet in my office that won't hold them all...it's quite ridiculous, looking at a closet, jam packed with notebooks and boxes of cards and then sitting outside of the closet are 7 more boxes of cards!
I have some valuable cards in the mix, Mickey Mantle, Ted Williams, Hank Aaron, Walter Payton, Michael Jordan, Kobe, Peyton Manning, etc...and then I also have my autograph collection in those boxes as well....over 500 autographs and memorabilia....with no where to go.
At one point, back around 8-13 years old, I could tell you everything about each one of those players, based upon the information given on the backs of those cards. Where they were born, what they weighed and what their batting and slugging percentages were in any given year. The statistics were memorized, because they were fascinating to me. I no longer hold that kinda info on these players, but at one time, it had become more than a hobby, it was a lifestyle! I loved everything about the hobby!
Fast forward to Wednesday afternoon, while sitting in the service for Ken Moore, I was heartbroken, red eyed from crying and emotionally, a wreck! Story after story, had me laughing and crying again, all in the same moment. I was reflecting on what an amazing friend I had lost and what a amazing person this world just lost!
When it was time for Ken's sister to speak, she filled in all of the old details that he had talked about, many times. The stories he had told me, were all true. And then, as she was explaining her brother, she said this, "you know how people collect things....stamps, cards, etc....Ken was a collector of people." And my heart became flooded with emotion because I had never heard a more truthful, fitting analogy of a person, in my entire life! Ken Moore was a collector of people, completely! It wasn't just a hobby, it was how he lived...his lifestyle!
Collecting people? Doesn't that sound weird or morbid, kinda? Not if you know someone like Ken! This guy never forgot a detail, a name, a face, nothing!!!! He had memorized the backs of each persons card that he met! I once stole his phone, to see if he had some sort of note system in his database somewhere, and of coarse he didn't! It didn't need to be written down, because it was not a hobby to Ken! It was how he truly lived!
I knew him to be that way with me and the people around him that I knew as mutual friends, but his wife shared a few stories with me after the funeral that just astounded me and made this "people collector" analogy even more concrete in my head...
As they were trying to contact people to let them know about his passing, they started to comb through his phone and call the people that didn't live nearby. What they found was an extensive phone book of contacts, people that his wife had no idea he was keeping up with...like the people in their old neighborhood in Virginia and most interestingly, the couple that they had gone out with on a double date, 30 years ago, before being married...Ken was still in active communication with them over the years!
This is not learned y'all, this is a way of living, truly caring about each person you ever come in contact with and making them feel important because you hold their friendship or acquaintance in high value to keep in contact with them. Ken, knew the details of each person he met. It's like the back of a baseball card....not just the team they were on, but where they were born, what they liked and didn't like, where they had lived, what their struggles and joys were about.
That's as real as real can get! That's genuine friendship....listening, not just talking....which is mind blowing to me because Ken was a talker! He carried every conversation and told story after story! An active listener and talker! That is rare my friends! I can only think of one person in history, who was like that....His name was Jesus! Jesus made people feel welcome, he made them feel like they all mattered equally, he listened and spoke! Attentive ears and powerful words that followed!!
Christ embodied for us, who we are to be to the world around us, His image, to a world in need of mattering to someone! I wish I possessed this gift! I have seen first hand, the life change that comes with treating people in this manner and it is beautiful to watch!
So, as you and I become more like the image of Christ as we follow Jesus, may it be our prayer that every person that we meet, feels important, connected and loved! Instead of looking at people as projects, let's begin to move away from the hobby of friendship and become more deeply connected to genuine friendship, by collecting people, knowing each with purpose! Not to fulfill anything in us, but to pour ourselves out and fill others! Yes please!
Each person in Ken's life was the only one that was important even if it was just a moment. His friendship and caring attitude is galvanized into my heart and hope to be more like my wing-man everyday!
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