12/14/08… Oh Father, You are taking me deeper. You have Redeemed my heart and You have shown me in order to love the poor and homeless, it is not good enough to just give my money, I must love and in order to love I must be in relationship. Now I feel You want to show me the breadth, the width, and the height of who You are and what is in me, yet to be tapped for Your glory.
Just nights before by the Opportunity Center, there is a memory etched in my mind of a woman with no home. Like a tattoo inked on my brain I see her wrapped in blankets and huddled tightly against the concrete loading dock wall as we are loading into our van to leave for the night. It is dark outside, it is late, and everyone has gone their separate ways but her and us. I climb into our heated van along with the rest of the street ministry team and peer out the front window to see her remaining behind. I already know tonight’s temperature will dip below 28 degrees…and I see that she is pregnant.
Returning to my home that night, I am drained. I cannot get her out of my mind. I am in my nice warm home; she is sleeping on cardboard with a life inside her. I crawl into my bed and pull the blankets over me to keep me warm and she resides in my thoughts as I toss and turn. Never in my life have I been presented with such gut wrenching truth as this. She might as well have been a piece of trash thrown out to the curb for pickup the next day. Oh Father, where is the justice here? You have handed down the indictment on my self-imposed sheltered life, and I am guilty. Guilty of a life that remained calloused and hardened to those who cannot help themselves by my apathy and my indifference. Who was I to judge in my indifference who needs help and who does not? This is not an intellectual discussion any longer, it is real, it is before my eyes, I now have seen it, and I cannot live with myself if I ignore it.
Father, I feel you are telling me this is what you see every day around this home I call earth…and it brings tears to Your eyes to see Your creations treat Your creations with apathy and indifference. To those You have blessed with much, to me, I for too long have hidden my eyes from what You see every second of the day. Now, in love, You have shown me the truth.
Fast forward the following week; Father you see the rain is coming down in arctic sheets. I am not sure if I have ever felt a driving rain this cold. There is a winter storm warning in effect which is very odd in Jackson, Mississippi. All of us, including our homeless friends, are huddled under the small canopy on the loading dock trying to keep warm and dry, but it is impossible when the biting wind and rain is blowing in at unheard of angles. Bob Ford and I head to the van to escape the weather because the canopy is too small to fit everyone under it. Bob tells me in his three years of this street ministry, never has he seen weather this bad. A young homeless person approaches our van. Bob rolls the window down and recognizes him as DeWayne so he steps out into the rain to talk with him. DeWayne asks him for a ride but I do not hear the destination. Apparently DeWayne and his girlfriend Monica walked 3 miles in order to receive help and nourishment. DeWayne climbs into the van and we talk some. Moments later he steps out to get Monica and they both return and climb into the van. I try to talk with Monica, but she is quiet and reserved, and trembling…and she is pregnant.
Their clothes are drenched. They do not have umbrellas because they must travel light. I can feel my jeans becoming saturated as the pools of water stream off Monica and onto the vinyl seat. Somehow the water finds its way to me and like Bounty towels my blue jeans soak it up. We begin driving and I begin thinking, where are they going to go? If they have no shelter, how can we drop them off in this biting rain and cold that will be with them throughout the night? I can’t bear to think of doing this to them. How can we kick them out of this van with friendly goodbyes and live with ourselves? A thought crosses my mind to invite them to my home for the night. The words start to churn inside me but the words churning inside of me are unable to find a voice. The minutes tick by and my conviction to speak grows, but I do not. Instead I remain in agonized silence. Why Father can I not utter the words? Is this not the Holy Spirit speaking in me to reach out? Your words in the Book of Luke tell us the story of a man robbed and beaten and left by the roadside. The beaten man in utter need sees those who can help him, even a priest, simply walk by him unconcerned by his dilemma. Am I to do the same to DeWayne and Monica? As I wrestle with my lack of unanswered risk, we stop in front of not so much a house, but a rundown duplex hut in a downtrodden neighborhood. Dewayne and Monica tell Bob this is where they are staying. Inside me a huge sigh is let out because I no longer have to ask them if they want to stay at my house. If only I had asked though, they would have told me it is ok, they have shelter. But I did not, and my God has searched me out. He has tested my heart and I failed once again. Why O God could I not utter the words?
A couple of days later the answer is revealed. I have given of my goods and money to feed and help the homeless and poor. Father you seemed to say thank you my son for reaching out to those in need with my goods and money, please go further. So I spent time in relationship getting to know those I was coming in contact with and truly learning how I can love them. Once again You seemed to say thank you my son for beginning to learn what it means to love those who are repulsed by many, please go further. At each turn, you Father, show me my unworthiness and yet somehow You do it in love, and Your love is ever patient, for it has to be for someone like me who continues to fail You over and over again. And now I have to look in the water and as Proverbs 27:19 says, “As in water face reflects face, so a man’s heart reveals the man.” My pride is the only reason not to write the following words, but Father you already know me, and there is no turning back for me, only looking forward. Is it not true, I still want to separate their world from my world? I have yet to truly love. Otherwise, why would I not offer to bring DeWayne and Monica into my home, like a son or daughter? At this realization, my heart sinks, my head lowers, and I realize how unworthy I really am to say that I know You…I do not.
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