Who Would Camp In Your Yard When You Break

Love is easy to talk about and harder to practice when someone is messy, distant, or shut down. We start with a clear, grounding framework from the Bible: two relationships sit at the center of a faithful life, our relationship with God and our relationship with other people. Jesus says it plainly in Luke 10:27, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. The challenge is not understanding it. The challenge is choosing it when it takes work.

I share a story that makes “love your neighbor” feel concrete. A church’s men’s ministry loses its place after new leadership and priorities, and the leader, Taylor, is crushed. He leaves, locks himself inside, and disappears into isolation. His friends refuse to let him drift away, so they do something bold: 150 men move into his backyard with tents, extension cords, and barbecues, rotating shifts so he is never alone. They hang signs, shout encouragement, and keep showing up day after day.

Even the police end up joining the effort, ringing the doorbell twice a day so Taylor has to face the reality that people are fighting for him. On day six, he finally comes out in tears and reconnects. We close with a simple, practical next step: think of the person in your life you have not heard from in a while, then reach out with a walk, a coffee, or a direct check-in. If you want Christian encouragement, Bible-based wisdom, and real-life ways to build faith and community, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review.

Transcript

Welcome And Daily Purpose

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Good morning and welcome to Starting Right. I am Danny Mack, and I'm going to be here every Monday to Friday to help you get a great start to your day. So grab your cup of coffee, sit back and relax for the next five minutes as I help you start your day by starting right.

Two Relationships That Shape Life

SPEAKER_00 0:35

The Bible is a very fascinating book, and it's very simply laid out. It's about relationships, two primary relationships, especially. The relationship between God and man and the relationship between man and man. At one point, Jesus was asked, What's the greatest commandment? And in Luke 10, 27, he said, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind, and then to love your neighbor as yourself. So if we understand that those are the relationships we need to have, we just need to understand how to build them and keep them. And here's where we sometimes run into a problem. Because building relationships takes work. It's not something that happens automatically. It's a matter of being active and doing what God wants us to do to build the relationship with Him and to build the relationship with other people.

Taylor And A Men’s Ministry Ends

SPEAKER_00 1:26

In his book, Mansfield's Book of Manly Men, Stephen Mansfield tells a wonderful story about an African American church in the southern part of the United States that for many years had a very powerful and effective ministry to men. And the reason this ministry was so good was simply because of their leader. Their leader was a man named Taylor. He was one of these big guys who always had a very loud voice and a great big hug and an incredibly infectious laugh. This was a fantastic ministry of this church, but then changes came about. There was a new pastor and a new budget and new priorities, and the men's ministry had to stop. Taylor was deeply hurt. He left the church. He went and locked himself in the house and he wouldn't come out. This went on for several days until a couple of the guys were talking, and they said, I wonder how old Taylor is doing. And you know what? I'm just not gonna sit here and let him sort of drift away. I'm just not gonna do it. So they started talking to some of the other men, and together the men came up with this idea.

150 Men Move Into The Backyard

SPEAKER_00 2:31

Within two days, a hundred and fifty men moved into Taylor's backyard. They set up tents and barbecues, they ran extension cords from the neighbors. They had everything they needed to stay there for the long haul if they had to. They decided that Taylor was going to come out, and they set up a schedule of rotation so that there were men always there, but everybody had an opportunity to get to work. You just gotta see this in your mind. A hundred and fifty men camped in Taylor's big old backyard with electric lines running from the neighbors' houses to power televisions and refrigerators. About twenty barbecues and smokers were set up making some of the best barbecue in the world, and there were big signs all over the place. Taylor, come out, we love you. Taylor, you're an idiot. Get out here. Taylor, we know where you live. One of the leaders later said, We had some fun, but don't think it wasn't a sacrifice. But we decided we would do it for Taylor. This went on for days. Taylor didn't come out.

When The Police Decide To Help

SPEAKER_00 3:29

At some point, Taylor obviously got ticked off because he called the police. When Taylor's wife and some of the guys explained what was going on, one of the policemen said, I wish the guys in our church loved each other this way. Don't worry, we've got this. The two cops drove away without really explaining what the we got this was all about. The next day, the police came back. They walked through the crowd of men without saying a word and rang the front doorbell. One of the officers shouted, Sir, sir, are you in there? Sir, are you okay? We've had a call that you might not be safe. Sir, you need to come to the door and let us know you're okay. Sir, are there guns in there? Of course nobody had called the police. These officers had decided to help. Finally Taylor came to the door and men camping in his yard exploded in cheers, which lasted until Taylor had finished his chat with the officers, and then he went back inside again. But the police came back twice a day, and not the same men either, different guys. Apparently the first two had let the entire police department in on what was happening, and they all agreed to help. So twice a day a patrol car pulled up to Taylor's house. Twice a day the policeman rang the doorbell. Twice a day one of them shouted that they received a call and needed to make sure Taylor was all right. Twice a day the men in the yard got to scream their love for Taylor.

Taylor Breaks And Comes Outside

SPEAKER_00 4:44

On the sixth day someone looked up, and there on the porch stood Taylor, crying his eyes out and through his tears telling everyone how sorry he was. Then he came out and embraced his friends. This story shows us the two relationships that we were talking about at the beginning of this episode. We see God's love and compassion for Taylor, that God was not going to let Taylor stay hurt and hurting and isolated. So God spoke to the men that loved Taylor, that had worked with him, that had grown to know him and had become friends with him. And then the men gathered together and said, Hey, Taylor's our brother, he's hurting, he needs us. We can help him, even though it's going to cost us, even though it's a sacrifice of our time and of our energies and of our convenience. We're going to help him because he's our brother and he is important to us.

Reaching Out To Someone Isolated

SPEAKER_00 5:32

You know, life is different for all of us. And even though we all have had a very difficult time over the last year, I know that there are some people who have felt that life has been piling on. There's been problem and disaster and fear and everything piled on all at once and they're hurting. Maybe there's someone in your circle of influence, someone that you know that you haven't seen or heard from for a while. Someone who may need someone to reach out and love them and encourage them. Someone who needs to know that they still are important to somebody else. That's what God's called us to do. To love Him and to love people. Even when it's inconvenient or uncomfortable. You don't have to go camp in their backyard, but you could ask them if they'd like to go for a walk or out for a coffee. Just something to let them know that you care and let God bless them through you.

Practical Next Step And Goodbye

SPEAKER_00 6:24

Have a good day, my friends. We'll talk again tomorrow. Thank you for listening today. And I invite you to join me Monday to Friday right here on Starting Right with Danny Mack.