Where Is Your Heart Without A Home?

I guess part of me did see the RV being used to put someone up. Eventually it would greet another wayward soul and provide shelter, albeit temporary.

Saturday night a family of four happened to have car trouble. They were trying to leave for Arizona but took the billowing smoke from their Pontiac to be a sign from God that they needed to stay put. So, a neighboring business pointed them in the direction of my church because they had heard we did things to help people.

(I'm still stuck on the cool fact that my church has made a name for ourselves. Hands and feet of Jesus at work.)

A few guys were asked to lend a hand and diagnose the issues. The children, a 2 yr old girl and 7 yr old boy, were checked into the children's programs and our executive pastor was found talking to the matriarch of the family. I'm not sure if they had dinner that night but we had some there to offer them.

After talking briefly with my friend, I learned they were homeless. The man and woman were married and they were raising their grandchildren,  who referred to them as Mom and Dad.

Homeless. How does this happen?

It is an all too familiar question for me. I have asked it many, many times. The longer I am in compassion ministry the more I come into contact with the working poor and homeless families. Jobs are lost and hours are cut. It is easy to get caught in the paycheck to paycheck lifestyle but what happens when the paychecks aren't enough to cover the cost to live?

There is a program called Financial Peace U. In the beginning there is an excercise about collecting the first $1, 000. Sell things if you have to, the FPU professor instructs, to get there. I wonder if this family, who sleeps in my driveway out in my RV, had done that. Did they have anything significant that added up to $1k? They drive a car. Was it an option to sell that to get a few more months in an apartment or did they make a better choice by keeping it?

I look at my own finances. I currently have no savings to account for. I have a savings account but in name alone. What is stopping me from the same fate?

I was once homeless. As an 18 yr old girl and again at 23. When I was 18, I found myself kicked out of the apartment I shared with my first boyfriend and his family. A physical fight was the result of a verbal fight. I will never forget how broken my heart was when he didn't come to my rescue as his older sister and dad took turns kicking me. I somehow ended up at a neighbor's across the building from where I had been living and took up a few nights there.

She was an older lady, definitely a grandmother and possibly old enough to be a great grandma. She took in this crying, abandoned girl who was several hours away from home, trying to make it on her own, working a dead end job at a Burger King she walked to and from. I remember crying in the dark and too sad and somewhat afraid to go to sleep in this stranger's home.

It had been many years since I had thought about that time in my life. Even now, the details are vague. I tried to recall her name, the lady who came to my aid. I'm not sure if it was in her livingroom that she set up a place for me to sleep or in a spare room.  It was something I had suppressed in my mind. An oddity of sorts, being how I pride myself in remembering the past. This memory though didn't resurface until this family had come, looking for help.

I know today that God never lets anything go to waste. Whether it be pain or victory, He finds a way to use it to bring glory. That night in 1993 came full circle on January 31, 2015. 22 years later, my pain was applied to further grow the kingdom of my loving and merciful God. I knew what that felt like, to have no home to rest my weary heart. I knew what it was like to have no money or resources to save myself. I needed an angel to pick me up off the ground and help me get back home. Maybe it was my turn to be that angel. Maybe, in the crazy scheme of things, the obedience in my heart and my willingness to follow Christ was what He needed me to do. To trust the outcome and not question the process. Afterall, is it not true that 'What you do for the least of my brothers that you do unto Me'?

Here I am, Lord. Is it I, Lord? I have heard You calling in the night. I will go, Lord, if You lead me. I will hold Your people in my heart.