This summer's CityLights team visited the 'homeless park' in downtown STL and invited three new friends home for dinner. I'll confess that I don't remember all of their names, but one in particular was a voice of assurance I needed to hear.
After a large-group discussion, Carl walked up to me. He'd already shared that he was many years clean of heroin addiction and found it gut-wrenching to watch other guys shoot up around him in the park. We started to chat about homeless folks I've gotten to know a little, and I decided to follow his vulnerability and ask the question I've been craving an answer to.
See, in my part of town, I don't encounter a lot of homeless folks in the park or walking down the sidewalk like in other areas of the city. Around here, I mostly only get to see folks for 30 seconds at a stoplight. The cast of characters changes regularly, which is already difficult for me because it's so hard to get to know any of them. But recently, my supply of mini-toiletries, snacks, and bus passes has run dry.
I hate, and I mean that, seeing someone with a "homeless: please help" sign and just driving past. I feel like I'm piling onto the thousands of messages these folks receive every day that they are worthless. I hate it. Many of these men and women are veterans or medical patients who can't afford things like cancer treatment. Many are already estranged from their families for being a drain. So when day after day, "productive" citizens scowl at, step around, or turn their faces from those who are most in need, they hear, "You have no value." I don't want to pass that message to anybody. Yet when I have nothing to offer, I don't know what to do.
Enter Carl.
I ask, "I don't want to ask you to be spokesman for 'the homeless,' but what do you think I should do? Would you appreciate someone just offering you encouraging words and prayer?"
"You say you have nothing to offer us," Carl replied, "but have you forgotten that prayer is the most powerful help you can offer? I've had people hand me everything you can think of out the car window--half-eaten sandwiches, even cans of beer. But let me tell you about the moment that's stayed with me the most out of all the time I've spend with my sign on a corner."
It seems a woman had pulled up beside him, rolled down her window, and said, "I don't have anything to give you, but I want you to know that God will see you, and I will remember you in my prayers."
He told me he thinks of her almost daily. "Ya know, the food and all that--that doesn't stay with you. What stays with you is knowing you're not alone; you're not nothing."
And then he spoke like he knew exactly what I needed to hear. He challenged me to be willing to feel rejected if every person I roll down the window for isn't thrilled to hear from me. He challenged me to make that sacrifice for the ones like him who would get through their days, maybe weeks, maybe months, on a few encouraging words.
God's blessing to me was seeing Scott, a homeless vet I'd spoken to once before, the first time I took Carl's advice.
When I yelled out, "Sir, is your name Scott?" a vulnerability and joy washed over his face like I could never have imagined. He remembered me too, and we chatted until he told me my light was green and I needed to go. I called out, "I still pray for God to provide for you, Scott!" and he just grinned back.
Man, I loved that smile.
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