Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Downtown 7/30/2012

A few weeks ago at a weeknight church gathering, I felt led to personally pursue a path of seeking to praise God every single day. I must tell you, this is not something that has come easily for me. In fact, I quickly run out of things to say. Oh, and I should add the praise I feel led to pursue is audible. That means I need to speak it out loud. Well, so far, I've mainly been doing it in the car on the way to and from work (about a 45-50 minute drive). After three weeks, this is still a work in progress. Monday when I arrived downtown, I had to get off at a different exit than normal due to the traffic conditions. As I worked my way back to Alameda St I drove by one of the alleys to see if anyone was there. To my pleasant surprise Willie and Tara Lee were there. As I pulled up, I started receiving the warmest welcome from Tara I think I've ever received. He told me how glad he was to see me and how wonderfull I looked! My mood, which had been somewhat passive and preocupied to begin with, and a little irritated with the traffic, changed immediately for the better. What a real, live demonstration of the power of praise! So often, I see a truth demonstrated in front of me while ministering to the poor. Once again, truth experienced is truth remembered. Now, it's up to me to put this truth into practice on a daily basis. Since I hadn't gotten any food yet, I asked the guys if they were hungry. When they said they were, I told them I'd return shortly with some food, which I did. While talking with them after returning, they told me of some of the difficulties they had had with the police running them off the sidewalks in the area lately. What was troubling them so much is that other homeless people with tents weren't run off and they were feeling specifically 'picked on'. My guess is that it was easier to run someone off without a tent than it is with someone who does have one. It's hard to know exactly the mindset of the policemen at the time. Anyway, at one point, Tara said something I won't soon forget. He said, "One day John, you'll speak for us." Whether or not I'll ever be in a position to speak for these people ( a people who have virtually no voice) I don't know. I know that I am able and willing to listen to them and hear their pleas for help. It reminded me of an interview I heard recently with a woman missionary in China. She and her husband have an orphanage for children with special needs. They visit orphanages and take the babies that the other orphanages don't want. Upon visiting one such orphanage the staff almost proudly said the 'babies don't cry here because they know they won't get any special treatment'. Isn't that something to be proud of? Well, this woman told of visiting one such orphanage where there was a very premature baby laying with only a partially formed skull and the head was badly deformed due to no skull. This baby was crying and as this woman picked her up and gently held her, she felt Jesus telling her to say to that baby, "I heard your cry and I sent her (this missionary woman) to you today." Well, I felt that was my calling Monday. To hear these men and listen to their heartache and tell them, "Jesus sent me to hear you today." --Until next week. --John

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Downtown 7/22/2012

"And anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name, just because you belong to me, will surely be rewarded." --Mark 9:41

Well, no one gave me a cup of cold water, but since it has been so hot, I decided it would be a good day to give the homeless I met a bottle of cold water. So I loaded up the ice chest with ice and bottled water and took-off for downtown. I hadn't been able to go since the barbecue (3 Sunday's ago) because of my schedule so I was really looking forward to going Sunday. As it turned out, it was a very quiet day. I think most everyone had looked for a place to hide from the heat. I prayer-walked on skid-row and then bought some burgers and started looking for folks. I found a couple of men (Willie and Steve) on one of the alleys off Hooper St., but none at some of the other 'regular' spots I go to. I even went over to Lincoln Park and didn't find anyone there. Robert who lives across from a mini truck stop on 4th and Alameda had already be given a stash of food from someone. I ended up down off Wall St and 9th around 6:45 p.m. Everything went quickly then. Everyone on that street was quite thankful for the help. I got a few laughs when I "apologized" for the water being 'so cold' that the bottles were hard to hold in your hand. Probably the most memorable moment came when I first arrived downtown and had finished prayer-walking the skid row area. I was getting in my car when I saw a man sitting near the door to the police station. I had noticed him earlier walking slowly and all bent-over like you see some old folks with osteoperosis. I felt he needed a bottle of cold water. After walking up to him and handing him a bottle from the ice chest, I said, "It looks like you could use this." I think he said, "God bless you." three times to me as I walked back to the car. --Until next week

Monday, July 2, 2012

Downtown 7/1/12---Summertime BBQ

Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: "The kingdom of heaven is like a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his subjects to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come.... Then he said to his subjects, "the wedding is ready...So go into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet." Those subjects went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found,...so the wedding hall was filled with guests. --Matt 22

In the blog for the last barbecue in October of last year I quoted Jesus at a dinner party telling the religious leaders to give a banquet to people who couldn't pay you back. We often go to dinner with friends and one time you'll get the check and the next time another will pay. Instead, Jesus tells us to give a dinner for people who can't reciprocate. Well, what happens when they don't show up? You can imagine my first thoughts when I drove down the alley Sunday and I didn't see anyone there! Here the car was loaded up (even remembered the charcol this time) and no one was around. Remember you can't call
homeless people up the night before to remind them. Well, I was about fifteen minutes early. I had seen two men at one end of the alley that I didn't (picture at right is the first alley all cleaned up and no one home) recognize. I decided to park and wait for a while and see if anyone showed up, then I'd go over to the next alley and see if anyone was there. My back-up plan was to go ahead and cook all the food and then drive around and give it out. The two men I had seen came by where I was parked in a couple of minutes and we exchanged hello's. One of them asked if I was the guy doing the barbecue! I told him I was, but where was everyone? I had noticed also that the alley had been cleaned up of all the trash that had been dumped in it. About two or three months ago someone drove a truck through there and dumped a couple of loads of trash in the alley. Well, the city workers had come through since last Monday and cleaned the whole alley of all the debris. The police had also come through and ran all the homeless people off. I asked these two men if they had seen Willie or Chris or anyone who had been living around there. They said they had probably moved over to the other alley. I decided to check a vacant lot between two of the buildings in the alley and sure enough, Willie and EJ were there. Willie said he was hoping I would show up, but didn't know if I was going to or not. We quickly agreed to go over to the other alley and do the barbecue there. Now the other alley isn't completely paved and that's the part where we were going to have to do it. Along the sides of this section of the alley are dried up weeds. The only spots with no weeds were in front of the roll-up doors of a couple of the businesses. One of my fears was what would happen if a police car came by while I had the grill going. In this area I knew they would shut me down immediately. So I had to pick the best spot I could that was clear and I still had to pull some of the weeds out. While I pulled some of the weeds out, I discovered too late that one clump of weeds had been someone's toilet. Yes, I got some on my right hand and I had no hand sanitizer with me. Last time it was the charcol, this time it was hand sanitizer! I did have some extra water so I cleaned my hands as best I could and kept going with the program. What else can you do? I figured with this kind of a start, it couldn't get any worse. So I set up the grill on a borrowed table at the back end of my car. The guys had started to congregate about ten yards from the front of my car. There were places for them to sit there because there was a make-shift 'home' for someone there. Anyway, at this point things started to go fairly smooth. EJ went and told Dave and Richard Brown who lived nearby and a few other men started to show up. I was only bummed about them stationing themselves the ten or so yards away from where the grill was. I was somewhat forced to stay by the grill and keep flipping burgers and wasn't able participate and talk in the 'group' setting. I would go down there periodically, but couldn't stand around there for long without having to get back to the grill. Richard stayed with me while he was there and a couple of other men did too and I was able to talk with them. One of the things I had hoped to be able to talk with the group about was their friends who die on the street. So guess what happened. A woman had come by (I'll call her Della) and joined us. She was 27 years old and a few months pregnant. We had seen each other a few times before and she remembered my name. She was sitting with the group of men and talking. In fact, she was telling them about some other woman who had died in a shopping cart down in the skid row area a few days ago. She was lamenting the fact that when she got there the coroner and police wouldn't let her get close enough to see who it was. Obviously, the police and the coroner wouldn't know who this woman was, but someone on the street just might be able to identify who it was and thereby help them be able to notify next of kin. I couldn't have asked for a better opening to talk about the subject. Unfortunately, I couldn't talk too long without having to go back to the grill. However, one of the goals of the barbecue was accomplished. The next one was the subject of forgiveness. I have noticed that the homeless are no different from any other group of people when it comes to this. Often times their limited circle of friends makes the situation worse and they become stuck over this problem and can't seem to get past it. They harbor grief in their hearts for years and years over something that happened long ago and bitterness and distrust of people becomes a huge part of their personality. I had heard a message on this about a week ago that was quite enlightening. In this message the pastor related the story in Matthew 18 about Peter asking Jesus if forgiving someone seven times was good enough. Jesus told him seven times seventy (which essentially means don't stop forgiving others). Then Jesus told a story about a king who forgave one of his subjects a debt of a huge amount of money, but when the subject sent someone else to debtors prison over a very small amount of money the king got very angry and ended up sending him to prison too based on his lack of forgiveness. The point being that God forgives us continually and we, in turn, must forgive others. This pastor went on to say that Jesus, when he was arrested was treated brutally before he was even crucified. Remember the Passion of the Christ movie? Jesus was a bloody mess in the end. What if Jesus had said, "You know I'm drawing the line at you guys pulling my beard out." Or, "Here I am willing to die for your sins, but I'm drawing the line a you shredding the skin and muscle off my back with your whips." Or, "No way you're blindfolding me and then using me as a punching bag, after all, I haven't done anything to deserve this!" Instead, Jesus took it all and said nothing. He saw the big picture. Not only was he setting the ultimate example for us, it was the main purpose in his coming. Well, I got to spend a great deal of time with two of the men who came by. One was Jessie and the other was Gus. In fact, Gus was one of the two men I had seen originally in the first alley. They came by at different times so I got to talk with them individually at length. It was pretty cool the way it worked out. With patience and God's timing it all worked out. I ended up cooking all the hamburgers before I left and then drove over to the area near skid row where I've helped the people living in the store doorways in the evening. It was almost 7 p.m. at this point. Once again, it was the perfect time to show up there. The last of the businesses close between 6-6:30 p.m. and so the homeless start showing up at just the time I showed up. I had a crowd of people around the car and gave out the rest of the food. I had taken two plastic tubs full of pants and shirts. When I got home there was only one shirt left and I must have given away two dozen pairs of socks too. I got to pray with people, I got to feed and clothe people. It was a good day downtown.

OK, so the last thing that occurred to me when I got home was this. I got home after 8 p.m. and was pretty tired, but there was still work to do (like emptying out the car and putting everything away). So as I'm doing this I was wondering about something. When God pulls us out of whatever predicament we're in, after it's over (when we think it's over) is He still having to 'clean up' our messes like I was having to do after my trip downtown? Just wondering.....--Until next time. John
At left is Jessie and Dave Parker by my car. You can see the other guys a little way down the alley. Below right is Richard Brown.
Below is the grill set up behind my car and the picture below that is what it looked like directly across from the grill. You can see all the dried up weeds along both sides of the alley. Yeah, people actually live in this alley! On the bottom picture you can see some black tarp/trash bags in the distance down the alley. That's where John Mellon lives. The stuff behind Jessie and Dave above where the rest of the guys were is where a couple other people live.