"You who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress: my God, in whom I trust.' For he will deliver you..." Psalm 91:1-3a
Shortly after I started this ministry, I dreamed of putting on a BBQ for my homeless friends. I had envisioned finding a place where I could set-up shop and serve the people coming by. Of course, I had a lot of fears about doing this. What if the authorities saw me with a BBQ fire on a public sidewalk? They'd probably shut me down. So I'd have to find a place sort-of out of the way, but where enough homeless people would see me and come by. You can't exactly call up these folks the night before or even advertise with flyers either. So up until this time I always picked a place where I knew 4-6 people lived and had them tell their friends to come around on the day I had planned. It usually worked out pretty well, but this summer that core of people that I usually met with have all gone their separate ways and there hasn't been 'a group' of folks as a starting point to do one. So I was back trying to just find a good location that would work. My first choice was a parking lot of a business that wasn't open on Sundays, but I never could get approval from them. I ended up using a small street called Channing just east off Alameda and 14th where the I-10 freeway-off ramp to Alameda St is. It was a short block east of Alameda and nearby the Jack in the Box which is the center of the homeless world in that part of downtown. There are two recycling places right by there. That generally insures a steady stream of homeless folks. After much prayer in the preceding days and weeks about this location, I set-up shop at 1:30 pm. Also, for the first time I had help. My wife and daughter and sister-in-law and her daughter were coming too. I loaded up my wife's car full of clothes the night before and with their help let them give out as many clothes as they could. If I got shut down because of the BBQ, at least we could give out clothes! Well, it worked out just fine. No problems with the authorities and we had quite a stream of folks coming by. Some even drove by and stopped (I'll get to those later). Since you always hear my side of the story, I thought I'd let my daughter and wife tell their story first.....
Allison's story:
For those of you who did not know, planning this BBQ was part of my Gold Award for Girl Scouts. I had put on a worship night at my school in June, in which people brought in old clothes and non-perishable foods as their "ticket" to get in. My dad spoke that night about his trips downtown and what God has been doing in his life and the lives of the homeless. I also did some fundraising to help pay for some of the supplies needed for this trip. Even with all the planning and assurance from friends and family, I was still extremely nervous. I kept thinking of everything that could go wrong, and my heart was filled with worry. I was having unusual dreams the nights leading up to it, and I couldn't fall asleep the night before. But Sunday afternoon had arrived, and we were all packed up and on our way.
When I was feeling especially nervous on the way there, I remembered in church that morning, our worship leader was encouraging us to be bold when God is calling us somewhere and to follow Him wherever He leads. Then, she sang one of my favorite songs. The bridge (and basically the main point of the whole song) goes like this:
"Spirit, lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever you may call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior"
That became my prayer for the day. I was still feeling a little uncomfortable, but God doesn't call us to "comfortable" places. He brings us to places in which we can only let The Spirit, the Comforter in the most uncomfortable places, take hold of us and use us to do His will.
The trip was more than incredible. My cousin and I helped many people by picking out clothes and shoes that they needed. It was amazing to see that we had exactly what they needed, in size and in style. Towards the beginning I got to meet Alexis, who was only a few years younger than me. She told me about her classes at school and her school uniforms. I told her that I had to wear uniforms at school, too. I also got to meet an older woman named Lola towards the end of the trip. She was tall and very thin. We gave her socks, shirts, and a few pairs of pants. We got to sit down and eat with her since she was the only one there for a while. She told us some of her story, and I was extremely blessed by her kind, gentle spirit. Everyone we met was so thankful for the things that I often forget to be thankful about. I was in awe of the miraculous work that the Holy Spirit did on that tiny street under the freeway. A passage that I've been thinking about is Ephesians 3:20, which says, "Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think." This whole trip would not have been possible without God's faithfulness, His provision, and His Spirit that dwells within us.
Lauren's story:
Any of you who know me well know that I tend to be kind of a worrier. And those of you who know me REALLY well are laughing right now that I said "kind of" a worrier. I am actually a full-fledged, bona fide queen of the worrywarts. So in the days leading up to the BBQ, I worried about everything from getting lice (I worked too many years in the foster care system to not worry about that) to gang activity to being robbed to us getting arrested (see, that's the thing about my worries - they don't have to have any basis in reality to begin to overtake my mind). But I knew God was calling us to follow Him to the streets of downtown Los Angeles.
In addition to the obvious prayers for safety and protection, I was also praying that I would be able to see these homeless people as God sees them, to have His eyes. Before John began his weekly trips downtown, I had a fairly judgmental attitude toward homeless people. I remember thinking "Something is really wrong with them if they have burned all their bridges and have nobody in their lives who will help them." Then when John began telling me stories about the people he was meeting, I became a little bit less judgmental -- but I was still kind of obsessed with the reason they were homeless. I sort of mentally put them in categories of who deserved help (mainly those who were mentally ill) and those who did not deserve help (drug addicts, alcoholics, etc.) I'm kind of ashamed to put that in writing but that's where my mind was.
The first person I met on Sunday was John Stokes, who has gone, in my mind, from being some nameless homeless guy, to John Stokes, some homeless guy who now has a name and who my husband has befriended, to John Stokes, a living, breathing human being who is shaking my hand, who is hungry and smiling and who has a story. Each of the people we met and helped on Sunday were unique and beautiful and had a story. A couple of them were a little bit . . . .um . . . . for lack of a better term, abrasive. I started to categorize them . . . John Stokes is deserving, that woman who just took some food and water and didn't say "thank you" -- undeserving! And then I thought, can you imagine if God put us in those categories -- who is deserving and undeserving of His grace and mercy? Can you guess which group wouldn't have any members? Would I be brazen (and stupid) enough to claim that I had never forgotten to say thank you to God for the many ways He has blessed me?
I am learning that we are all on equal ground at the foot of the cross -- there is no one more deserving than another -- in fact, we are all pitifully and unmistakably undeserving. In that way, I have more in common with John Stokes then I am different from him. And whether you are Lola who lives under an overpass in central Los Angeles, or Lauren who lives in a little, old, comfortable house in a suburb, or Joe Blow who lives in a mansion (I had to use the name Joe Blow because I don't know anyone in real life who lives in a mansion), God sees us all as His precious children who He would do anything to save and for whom He would go to any lengths to rescue. And we all need rescuing.
Finally, you will read in a minute how John had to drive around to find his friends to tell them about the barbecue. He worried the whole time about his one friend, Michael, who he thought was going to be there. Once the initial crowd died down and had eaten, John got in his car to go find Michael. I was initially a little irritated that he was leaving his wife, sister-in-law, daughter, and niece alone under questionable circumstances, but I eventually got over my irritation . . . it helped that he was only gone about 5 minutes or less. He came back and said "I found Michael. He's coming." The look of relief on John's face that he had found his friend and was going to be able to give him lunch was another high point of the day. It wasn't until later that night that I remembered the parable of the wedding feast that Jesus told, where none of the invited guests came and so the party host goes out into the streets and invites the people in the street. Michael didn't say much, he just ate his hamburger and left. But I have to believe he slept a little more soundly last night knowing that his friend John came and sought him out and invited him to come and eat.
How blessed we are to have a God who pursues us because He wants to shower us with His mercy. How can we not share that with others?
John's wrap-up:
So because of my fear of lack of people showing up that I mentioned early on, I had driven around the area where people that I knew hung-out and let them know where I was doing the BBQ. None of the people that I told who were west of Alameda came by. The people east, the side of Alameda where I had set up, started coming by as soon as they started smelling the BBQ fire. John Stokes and his buddy Dave came by first. I had rented some chairs so people could hang-out for a while. I also rented some tables to have room for not only the food, but the clothes as well.
Soon there was a wave of folks that came by. I was busy cooking burgers and brats and the girls got to talk to the people and welcome them, help serve the drinks and help them find clothes. There was one woman named Alondra that came by in a car. Fairly late model car at that. She came by several times, ate, got some clothes and even came by again asking for some napkins to clean her car windshield. I guess her wipers didn't work. Anyway, she came by a fourth time and just asked me to pray for her, that was it. Didn't ask for more food to take with her or more clothes, just came back for me to pray for her. Then she came back one more time a little while later. She kept saying, "God bless you." several times and gave me a $20 dollar bill. I told her, she didn't need to do that, but she insisted and said, "God bless you." to me again. I didn't get to pray with everyone, but several people I did get a chance with. Early on I was doing a lot of cooking. Things finally slowed down a bit so I could take some pictures. You can see the massive freeway support column there in the middle of the picture. Being underneath a massive concrete 10 lane freeway brought to mind the image from the verse I opened with in Psalms of God being a Mighty Fortress. That's why it was easy to claim this turf as His Kingdom Turf!!!! We were under His mighty fortress.
Towards the end a homeless man who apparently was a Vietnam vet showed up across the street. He was talking very loudly to himself and I could sense the girls were very uncomfortable about it. He stayed across the street on the corner, but I couldn't resist the opportunity. I made up a burger and took it over to him and asked if he was hungry. He turned to me and with what appeared to be tears in his eyes said, "Yes I am." I gave him the burger and asked if I could pray for him and he said yes to that too. So I prayed for him a short brief prayer and he thanked me. We looked at each other straight in the eyes and I could see he was fighting back tears again. I thanked him for his service to our country. He then showed me a newspaper article he had in his hand with a picture of an unidentified soldier in battle. It was of a marine in Afghanistan. He had told me his name was Mr Johnston and he started talking about the Marines. It was obvious he was still living his war experience. I asked if he wanted some water too and went back and got him a bottle when he said yes. Eventually, he crossed the street and came over, but stayed on my end of our set-up. A few other homeless folks came by and said hello to him and called him Damion. He stayed near me until we had packed everything up (my wife was nervous about leaving me alone with him). When everything was cleaned up the girls took off and I walked across the street where a man named Willie lived on the sidewalk. He was asleep when I arrived. He woke up and came over and ate, but now he was asleep again. I just wanted to say good-bye, but he was sound asleep. I took a picture of him to show what a very contented person looks like after one of my BBQ's! As I walked back to the car, Mr. Damion Johnston was kind of crouched down on the sidewalk. I had my camera phone and asked him if he would give me a salute before I left. He immediately stood up and turned his back towards me and arranged his clothes so he looked 'proper'. He then did an about-face and in all seriousness, looking left and right to other imaginary soldiers, shouted out like a drill instructor, "Ten hut!" and then snapped off a salute. I took the picture and then saluted back. It was quite a moment.
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| Willie sound asleep, but with a full stomach. |
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| Damion Johnston, at attention. |
As I drove away I had two cooked burgers left. I hadn't eaten anything yet, but thought I'd stop by where Rocky the pit bull dog I have befriended lives and have one with him. As I drove down the little street to get to the alley where he's penned up, I passed a homeless man sitting on the corner who I've helped a few times before. I drove on into the alley where Rocky was. As I pulled up Rocky is immediately licking his chops and getting all excited. It was the classic sight of a happy and expectant dog. I gave him the burger and he wolfed it down in a couple of seconds. So here I am sitting in the car with one burger left, I haven't eaten and there's a homeless man on the sidewalk on the other side of the block. You know I wouldn't feel right eating it myself. So, yeah, I drove around the block and gave it to Oscar (I think that's his name). I told him as best I could (he doesn't speak much English) that it was the 'ultima' (last) burger I had. I had a small bag of crackers and pieces of candy in a bag and gave him those too. He then asked for some 'calcetines' (socks). I had some new ones within reach so I gave him two pair. Then he asked for some water. I usually give out bottles of water with the food, but since the car had been repacked after the BBQ I wasn't really sure where the water bottles were, but I told him to come around to my side of the car and look in right behind me. So he finds the water bottles and takes one, then asks if he could have the half bag of BBQ chips that were right there too. I said, 'sure go ahead'. I had to smile as I drove away, because one bottle of water wasn't going to be enough for a half a bag of BBQ potato chips, but he was on his own now.
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| My little car loaded up with the BBQ food and stuff |
So I had arrived downtown at about 12:45 and started driving around to drum up business. Then I started setting up the BBQ at 1:30pm. We were all packed back up at 4:30 pm. So in 3 hours time we served probably 20-25 homeless people (more than I ever have before) with food and clothes and enjoyed their company most of all. We 'hosted' a banquet for people who can never repay, but whom God finds precious and somehow provides for daily. They got a 'family type' BBQ in the summer like they probably had long ago when they were growing up. I prayed with probably a third of the people and yet all of them knew the reason we were there is because we serve the King of Kings. Our Kingdom of Heaven turf was secure and protected the whole time. We were indeed blessed.
Until next time. --John.
