Of Custodian Keys and Barber Chairs: God’s Providence
Have you ever looked back on your life and seen a thread that travels all the way back to an earlier time. And, when looking back at the thread and the points where it attaches, you see themes. It doesn’t attach to everything. Not even to all of the geographic locations that you have lived in or all of the jobs that you have worked. But in some way it shows up.
I think of the novel Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry. A book that I grow fonder of the more distance I have from it. Jayber is a barber. But not necessarily because he set out to be a barber. Nor did he know that his part-time job sweeping floors at a barbershop when he was living at a boarding school would be an important part of his life. It was just a part-time job for a kid in need of a few bucks.
But then Jayber finds himself in a city working in a horse barn and he goes to get a haircut and finds that there is an empty chair without a barber. He uses what he learned about cleaning a barbershop and the knowledge he had about cutting hair (that was graciously provided at his previous job) and he finds himself employed and paying his way through college. But then circumstances lead him back towards his childhood home, and when he arrives it just so happens that the town barber has just closed the shop and moved away. Jayber is in the right place at the right time, but, he also has the right skills and a little savings. In that sense he made his own luck, but the timing was certainly advantageous.
Wendell Berry’s telling of Jayber’s story draws the reader’s attention to a couple of things that we sometimes miss, whether in our youth or simply because we have blinders on.
One, no job is meaningless. I don’t mean this in a philosophical way as if to say “all work matters,” though I do think that. I mean it in a very practical way. Every job that we do provides us the opportunity to learn and develop. This could be a specific skill such as cutting hair. It could also be — and nearly always is — a core skill such as sticktoitiveness, time management, conflict resolution, customer services, or problem-solving. Perhaps we also gain character traits like humility, patience, and kindness. These takeaways can be gained from any job whether it’s making tacos, mowing grass, filing papers, or babysitting. And these skill sets will better prepare you for your next opportunity.
Two, there is often a thread. A thread that is mysteriously connected through life and when examined reveals the kindness of God. Jayber didn’t know that being in a boarding school and working a part-time job in a barbershop would serve him well throughout his life. Sometimes it’s difficult to see God’s hand at work until years later.
My janitor to Jayber’s barber. When I was in graduate school I was recruited to serve part-time as the director of a college ministry. This was a great supplemental income to the part-time work that I was doing as a Resident Director at the university. Both jobs were highly relational and, like many part-time jobs, either one of them could have been full-time. But also, like many part-time jobs, neither employer had the funding to bring me on full-time. That is until one of the janitors at the church left. The leadership came to me and said, “We found a way to have you here full-time and provide you with health insurance. You can work 20 hours a week cleaning the church and pre-school and continue your 20 hours as the Director of College Ministry.” This was great news and simplified my life (though I loved my other position). On Sundays when everyone cleared out, I cleaned the children’s Sunday school rooms and rearranged them to meet the needs of our weekly pre-school that the church offered the community.
I quickly learned several valuable lessons.
1. The small toilets in preschools are just for show. They could just as well put a Post-It note on the floor of a closet and serve the same purpose. No kids are even attempting to hit the target.
2. There is no job that is below me. On days when I was working as the Director of College Ministry, I would get calls from the preschool director because the full-time janitor was busy or at lunch and there was an “emergency.” This is code for “some kid just lost his breakfast and they found it on the floor.” While I might have been in the middle of something that I deemed important to my title as Director, I dropped what I was doing to find the pink sawdusty stuff and soak up vomit. And, that was just as important.
3. I was not, in fact, a janitor. I was a custodian. And, I would remain so for the rest of my life. See, when we think of a janitor we tend to think of specific tasks such as mopping the fellowship hall, dusting the shelves and displays. A custodian, however, does that and more. A custodian is a steward. And, custodians do a number of things, hold a number of powers, and are burdened with the weight of responsibility that ordinary people do not have.¹ Think about it. The custodian is one of few people that have keys and access to every room in the building. They have the burden to remain a person of character when they see and hear confidential things. The custodian is often the only one in the building. This means that they are the security. If they see suspicious behavior they need to respond. If they find doors left unlocked they lock them. They are the face of customer service when someone shows up and no one else is present. The custodian is the one who says I’m sorry you are not at the correct location, or at the correct time, here is the accurate information. The custodian is often the only one that sees everything as their responsibility. If there is a wrapper on the ground in the parking lot, they are not walking past it assuming that it is someone else’s job to pick it up. If the little disposal bag where women deposit their feminine products is full, the custodian empties it. If the sound system is acting up and no sound-tech-person (official title) is around, the custodian gets called in. It’s amazing the mindset that a custodian needs to have. One of my roles was to set up tables and chairs for the deacons’ meetings. I would carry out six to eight heavy wooden 8ft tables and place chairs around them for a meeting of 25 men whose role by definition is to serve. The custodian is a guardian. They get to practice it every day. The Lord has made us all guardians.² Perhaps those who are most equipped to answer this call are those who already see themselves as the custodians of other people’s things. This was and still is a great lesson for me.
Years later in a different state and in different circumstances, I found myself in the middle of the economic recession looking for work and unable to find something suitable to provide for my family. And then, a custodial job was posted. It required a minimum of 2 years of custodial experience. I had the qualifications because years earlier, by God’s grace, I was given the opportunity to provide for my family by cleaning the church. Not only was this a major blessing for my family from a provision standpoint, it was also important for my own heart. I had unknowingly become arrogant. I had come to think of the previous custodial work as a stepping stone. Now I was older, more qualified, more educated, and I was applying for jobs that had offices that were cleaned by custodians. Jobs in offices in the same building that I was now cleaning. It was humbling. But it shouldn’t have been. I had already learned that no job was beneath me, that all work was valuable and that a custodian was a worthy role. But I had forgotten my calling and this job served as smelling salts to bring me back to clear thinking. And there God tied a knot in the thread of my life that I can trace back to an earlier time and see His thoughtfulness going before me.
Like Jayber, I must acknowledge, “Often I have not known where I was going until I was already there. I have had my share of desires and goals, but my life has come to me or I have gone to it mainly by way of mistakes and surprises. Often I have received better than I have deserved. Often my fairest hopes have rested on bad mistakes. I am an ignorant pilgrim, crossing a dark valley. And yet for a long time, looking back, I have been unable to shake off the feeling that I have been led — make of that what you will.”
Both Jayber’s story and my own provide me perspective regarding circumstances that I find myself in where I do not understand “why me” or “why now.” I trust a little more in the hope that God is not absent.
It is perhaps the same peaceful reassurance that I read about in C. S. Lewis’s The Horse and His Boy when Shasta protests, “Don’t you think it was bad luck [for me] to meet so many lions?” and Aslan answers, “There was only one lion…. I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you as you slept. I was the lion who gave the horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.”³
Barber. Janitor. Runaway boy. Providence.
¹The word Janitor actually comes from the Latin word Janua, meaning “door”. A Janitor was a doorkeeper or porter. The word Custodian comes from the Latin word Custodia meaning “protection” or “safekeeping”. A Custodian had custody of a place or guardianship over it.
²Genesis 2:15
³The Horse and His Boy by C. S. Lewis
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