Rediscovering Humanity
A chance encounter at a bookstore reminded me what real connection looks like in a world where vulnerability feels risky and rare.
“May I ask you a question?”
The voice came from a young woman browsing cookbooks at Barnes & Noble one Friday evening. My wife and I were relaxing nearby while our 11-year-old daughter finished exploring.
“Sure,” we replied.
I’ll admit — we’re not the type to strike up conversations with strangers. Despite both being pastors, my wife and I are introverts. When we finally get a break from ministry, we gravitate toward quiet spaces, which explains our family night out browsing books after dinner.
I honestly thought it was going to be a simple question — maybe directions or the time. But instead, she asked:
“How did you learn how to cook?”
Wow.
That’s an interesting question. I immediately laughed in my head thinking, “She’s making quite an assumption thinking we even know how to cook.”
In fairness, we do cook reasonably well, although we keep things very simple. We’re more in the “semi-homemade” category. We don’t make our own sauces or pastas from scratch and, honestly, who has time to chop up garlic when you can buy it already minced in the jar?
Still, I was impressed by the thoughtfulness of her question.
The Pressure to Perform
My wife shared a bit about learning to cook from her family growing up. For me, it’s been more about experimentation and a few tips and tricks I’ve picked up from Food Network.
She shared with us how many people she knew learned from their mothers and grandmothers but that she had never had that opportunity. Now in her early thirties, she felt like she was missing something essential as she stepped more fully into adulthood.
She had a cookbook in hand, but as she spoke, it became clear - the books were making her feel more overwhelmed than inspired.
Each recipe seemed more complicated than the last: unfamiliar techniques, pricey ingredients, long prep times. Her determination was slowly giving way to discouragement.
We didn’t give her a master plan, but we affirmed her feelings.
We have also found that many cookbooks are too complicated for the average home-cook like us just trying to get something on the table between work, school, and evening activities. Not to mention the countless expensive ingredients that you might buy for one recipe and then let sit in the cabinet for months until it eventually goes bad. Hence, our more simplistic, semi-store-bought approach, which in my humble opinion, still often turns out as good as many restaurants.
A Small Shift with Big Impact
By the end of our conversation, she decided not to buy the book, to the dismay of the store employee who just happened to walk by right at that moment. But she seemed more comfortable with the idea of starting simple and with how to find specific recipes with her favorite ingredients online.
It was like a visible weight lifted from her as she came to accept that not everything had to be from scratch and use a lot of complicated recipes and ingredients.
She put the book back on the shelf, thanked us again, and walked away with a new sense of hope and confidence. I really do believe she will learn to cook.
But more than that, I believe that she will be even more comfortable in trusting her own instincts that made her question all those cookbooks in the first place.
More Than Just Cooking
For me, however, this isn’t about cooking at all. The conversation could have been about anything. She could have been looking at a book on home repair, on writing, on parenting or marriage, or any number of other subjects, and what lingers with me would be the same.
The reason this conversation stays with me is her boldness and willingness to step out and ask an honest, vulnerable question to a stranger and the opportunity that created for such a warm, heartfelt, and authentic conversation that is all to rare in our age of soundbites and emojis.
The Rare Courage of Vulnerability
As I said, I’m an introvert serving in ministry. This requires me to act like an extrovert much of the time. In some ways, I could say I’m part of the problem in that I’m certainly not going to be the one to start any conversation with a stranger, especially not one so personal as her opening up about her own struggles with cooking. The cynic in me has come to believe that most people are not interested in anything I have to say. They just want validation of their own opinions.
But this young woman gave me a glimpse of something I have been deeply missing for years…
Humanity.
Even in church, people are often afraid to be seen. I know people who avoid worship because they don’t feel emotionally strong enough to fake a smile or can’t afford to dress nice enough. Some stop coming after needing a cane or a walker saying, “I just don’t want anyone to see me like this.”
We live in a world where vulnerability often feels unsafe.
We filter ourselves to the point that even asking for help becomes a rare and radical act. We don’t want anybody to see us as we truly are, and perhaps that’s at least in part because we don’t really want to see ourselves as we truly are. We want to look in a mirror and see the person society tells us we should be, and there is no shortage of voices trying to sell us something to get there.
The Gift of Being Human
I’m so grateful for this woman’s courage.
She didn’t know how we’d respond. We could’ve ignored her, pulled out our phones, brushed her off or even judged her.
Yet in the end, her humanity won out.
She was humble enough to ask for help. She was brave enough to trust a stranger. She was human enough to choose connection over pride.
She was on a journey. Her determination to make a change in her life led her to the bookstore that night, only to be overwhelmed by the amount of information at her fingertips.
Then her humanity kicked in. She was willing to risk a face to face conversation with strangers to learn not from the text on a page or on a screen, but from another person’s real-life experience.
We are nobody special, and we are certainly not experts on cooking. We just happen to understand people. We understand the longing for connection, for growth, and for understanding.
I have journeyed with many people through deep struggles over my 20 plus years of ministry.
But rarely have I felt more pastoral –
No, more human –
than I did in that Barnes and Noble, swapping cooking experiences with a perfect stranger.
💬 Join the conversation:
I’d love to hear how you experience being more fully human in a world where so much of our lives is filtered through screens.
When have you felt a real, unfiltered connection with someone recently?
What helps you stay grounded in your humanity amidst the noise of daily life?
Have you ever had a meaningful encounter with a stranger that stayed with you?
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Coming in two weeks: “Invitation: Hearing God in a New Way”
What if God isn’t just commanding or demanding — but inviting? In my next reflection, I’ll share how one question reshaped the way I pray, opened me to the unforced rhythms of grace, and helped me hear God’s voice with new ears.
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Learning to cook with a cookbook is akin to trying to experience God via theology books! Usually it doesn't work!
I have much empathy for the younger generations who have entered adulthood over the past 25 - 30 years. Many of them did not benefit from observing parents or grandparents preparing family meals.
Most older adults learned to cook by helping in the kitchen and watching others cook. Now family meals often consist of microwave dishes or restaurant takeout or quickly made sandwiches.
Where does someone go to learn basic cooking skills? Cooking isn't taught in public schools. Unlike driver education, there are no cooking education classes.
During my later years as an Army chaplain, I found this to be a common frustration with many young military couples. They didn't have a clue about cooking! I searched for possible military family support agencies that might offer cooking classes, but I couldn't find anything.
I wonder if churches could meet this need? Among elderly church members can be found a bounty of great cooks! Perhaps cooking classes could be a wonderful intergenerational ministry!
Thank you, Craig, for sharing your experience. It’s amazing how such a simple topic can unfold into something deeply meaningful — a reminder of how being vulnerable can create space for connection, especially since all of us are learning in our own ways.
As an introvert myself, I don’t usually talk much — especially not with strangers. But I do have an unfiltered bond with my cousin, someone I can truly be myself with.
In daily life, when things go haywire with people, I try to pause and remind myself to be kind. I ask myself what might be going on beneath the surface. I truly believe that when someone behaves negatively, it’s often rooted in a past experience — with me or someone else — that has left an impact.
It reminds me of an incident that still warms my heart. My mother and I were once heading home after a Christmas program, quite far from where we live. It was late, and we were waiting for a particular bus. A local stranger approached us and asked what route we were waiting for. We trusted him and told him, and he kindly guided us to the right spot. As we started walking there, he came back again and said, “If you don’t get that bus, try these ones — they’ll take you close enough, and you’ll find more options from there.”
We were so grateful — and sure enough, within 10–15 minutes, our bus arrived. We thanked God and felt immense gratitude toward that stranger. Even now, we often talk about him and his kind gesture. I don’t know if he checked on us again after we walked away, but I truly bless him — and people like him — who carry such simple, genuine goodness in their hearts.