Courtney and I had an awesome opportunity to travel down with Dude Share the Food again this past Saturday. At first, it seemed pretty much like other times that we have gone downtown, with the exception that it was a bit colder...
(here we are packing up the bread truck with some clothes, blankets, and food)
(lining up for some food...there was a huge turn out)
After a little while Courtney, Brandon, Collin, Jessica, Ashley, and I went over to this bridge (not pictured, sorry) and saw Charles and Marcus. These are probably the two nicest men I have ever had the privilege to meet. They were so loving and so humble. After catching up on what was new with everyone, Charles asked us if we could pray and then sing a song. So we all gathered around, held hands, and prayed. After the prayer, we sang "Amazing Grace." While we were singing this song, I looked around us and just thought to myself, "here these men are in the freezing cold, having only the clothes on their backs and a few blankets to keep them warm, and only having a bridge to keep them dry. They are singing at the top of their lungs, louder than anyone else- AMAZING GRACE!!???" This was a very eye-opening experience for me. These two men inspire me. I can only pray that I can have that attitude when things do not go quite the way I plan. After another prayer from a woman with us, we said our goodbyes and Charles had to make a point to hug everyone. "I do this to everybody, you'll get used to me," is what he said. Such love he has. He told my wife, "we all in the same family... like a bouquet just with a bunch of different flowers." That has stuck with me for the past few days.
The family of God is not just white people, not just black people, not just Asian, Chinese, or whatever you want to put on it. We are all sinners and fall WAY short of God's true standards for our lives.
I could care less what you have on your church sign, if you are Baptist, Methodist, Church of Christ, Church of God, Assembly of God... that's just a bunch of junk! We all have ONE God, ONE creator, ONE Savior -- JESUS! Love God FIRST, the rest will follow.
Charles and Marcus didn't ask us what church we were from, they just wanted to know our names. They didn't care what denominational ties we had, they just wanted to sing with us. They just wanted us to pray with them. Not just for them, but WITH them- there is a difference.
So many of us "Christians" like to pray FOR the homeless, but when are we going to sit and talk with them? When are we going to love them where they are? It's so easy to schedule a time to go and share food with them, because we get to go back to our little comfy homes and heat. I am very guilty of this. Let's get real... Jesus had no place to sleep.... interesting huh?
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