As I wrote in the post from March 18th, I
started going to the Red Zone with Jamie on Tuesdays. I went again last Tuesday and, God willing, I
will go with her tomorrow.
Today I want to share another, continual, observation
I am having. Looking out through the
bars of the door I observe all sorts of things happening on the street. Mostly it’s the pimps and boyfriends either
trying to get into the women’s center or trying to get the women to hand them
stuff through the door.
There are many other things too. One Tuesday I happened to see one of the
young women who had just a little while earlier had been in the center. Now she was across the street standing in
front of one of the sketchy motels on this street. As she was standing there a guy walked up to
her, opened her purse, took stuff out and walked away. I stood and pondered that for a while and it
has come to my mind a number of times since.
A couple of weeks ago I notice a guy sitting on the
sideway a couple of doors down from the center, across the street. My eyes fixed on him and I observed several
things about him. He was extremely
dirty. It appeared that he had either
camouflage or dark green fatigues with a big coat. His clothes seemed to be about three sizes to
big for him.
As he sat on the sidewalk with his back leaned up
against the wall, he kept patting one of the two really big, black trash
bags. Each looked to be a 55-gallon
bag. The way he was patting the one bag
for a second, I wondered if there was a body inside of it; (haha my crazy
imagination)but as he moved it around, I could tell it was full of either rags
or clothes.
He had matted hair and he kept fluttering his fingers
across his forehead. He seemed to not be
able to sit comfortably because he kept fidgeting around as he sat.
My thoughts went to wondering how long this man had
been living on the street? How long does
it take to look like that?
As I stood staring at him through the safety of the
bars of the door my mind went through all sorts of scenarios as to who this guy
was and who had he been before.
Then a thought came to me. Is this guy an angel? Stay with me here as I explain this
statement. I truly believe that angels
visit us. God tells us this in Hebrews
13:2. I can testify to at least twice
when, I believe, I was ‘entertaining’ an angel.
Anyway, the thought of him being an angel came to me
and I wondered if God was testing my compassion. I know that at times in my life I have not
been very compassionate. It is something
I have tried to be better at.
I thought about it and I prayed about it, then I
unlocked the door, stepped out, relocked the door and then walked directly
across the street to a small tienda (store).
I bought two pieces of fried chicken and some tortillas from the very
grumpy lady. Then I walked down to
Mister Dirty Street Guy. I know that’s
not his name but at the time that was the best way I could describe him.
I asked him if he liked chicken and gave him the
food. As I was looking right at his
face, he answered me in a language I can’t even describe. It wasn’t Spanish and it certainly wasn’t
English. All I could do was stare at him
as he took the food and hid it under one of the plastic bags.
After a few seconds I just smiled at him, then turned around and walked back and locked myself back inside the women’s center. As God leads me I will relate to you my experiences with trying to minister to this guy. Until he tells me his name, I plan to call him Leroy
p.s. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY SISTER IN LAW CHRISSY!!!
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