The coffee bean shop is strictly functional. On the plus side, there are transparent bins of roasted beans with labels describing origins and the roasting details. Additionally, there are a few grinders, one scale, and even a coffee machine. It is as basic and functional as a glass-walled shop on the second level of a working-class strip-mall-style building can get.
In this shop, there are no tables, napkin dispensers, or ways to relax, except for two chairs. Almost randomly, they are placed on the back of the glass wall signage. I guess one could sit there, but I am not sure why. Except for the one person who appears when you walk in, the store seems to be empty of all human life.
Even as I listened to lesson whispers about the coffee beans, I caught my mind wandering. What purpose did the two chairs have? Had anyone ever sat in them? Why would someone spend money on the chairs and place them in an otherwise no-invitation-to-sit store?
For a bit, I was totally distracted. If the chairs were all about having a coffee, then why all the beans? I found myself so focused on the chairs that, for just a moment, I forgot why I was in the store. The drift took me to the other places in my life where I misplaced my focus. An old warning replayed as I considered the scene; “By shifting our focus from what we do to what God does, don’t we cancel out all our careful keeping of the rules and ways God commanded? Not at all. What happens, in fact, is that by putting that entire way of life in its proper place, we confirm it.” (Romans 3.31)
As I came back to the centre, I had a fresh appreciation for the consideration of those shopping with others who were not interested. While not many, each had a place to rest and relax. They could watch without needing to stand or be a direct part of the conversation. Beans are the store’s centrepiece around which everything revolves
