Hands & Feet
This started out as a caption for an instagram picture and turned into a blog...sometimes I even surprise myself for my inability to use few words. Ha.
I was going to post a picture collage of the college ministry at my church serving sack lunches to homeless people on Thursday night. Then it turned into me writing about what Thursday night did in my heart instead of posting a picture about college kids (even though those kids are awesome).
I didn't want to write this blog. I really just wanted to go to bed and push these thoughts away.
I think Jesus purposefully keeps me awake sometimes until I write. So, here we are. It's currently 1:26AM, in case you were wondering.
I used to feel so burdened for homeless people.
One time, when I was in the youth group at the church I grew up in, we were homeless for a weekend. "Plunge to Poverty." Seriously. My parents surrendered me to the church on a Friday night with a lot of the other youth kids. We were only allowed what clothes we had on. Nothing else. We had to panhandle for money. We walked all over OKC. We only ate if we had enough money to buy food (thank God for Little Caesar's $5 pizzas). It was the first weekend in December, it was freezing and drizzled and there was sleet the whole weekend. We made a fire in a trash can. We slept cuddled together in corners ( I woke up with a mouse on me. Ew). Some of the guys even slept in a dumpster, which was a great idea because, apparently, dumpsters are really warm inside.
One night we went inside the church gym for what they called the World Dinner, I think. There were different countries represented. You drew a piece of paper and went to that country's spot on the gym floor. The number of you there represented a certain 1,000 of people in that country, or something like that. Asian countries were highly populated, America had two people, etc. They served you what was an average meal for that country. I was some Asian county, I can't remember which one. But I remember that all we got was a half a cup of rice and a small amount of black coffee. That was it. And there were rules: no sharing with anyone within your country or with other countries. So when some people didn't eat their meal, for whatever reason, you had to stare at it and you couldn't eat it. Most of the countries didn't have big meals. Some had decent sized, but not too much that there were leftovers. Then there was America. Most of the other countries were sitting on the floor. America had a table. They had so much food--appetizers, main course, dessert, snacks. There were only two people at the American table. They literally could not eat everything in front of them--there was so much it was impossible. Then some people came out with trashcans, and while all of the other countries watched they dumped every piece of excess in the trash. I was starving. This is where I lost it. I cried. I was frustrated and defeated. I felt saddened for other countries who looked at us this way, or even the poor within America that looked at us the way I looked at the people at the America table. It was awful. And I cried the most because, even though it was awful, I knew at some point I would get to go home. I was so sad for people who actually lived this way but didn't have a hope of the weekend being over and getting to go home. Maybe that all seems a little dramatic, but it worked. Most of the weekend, the youth leaders took turns talking about poverty and what the Bible says about it. I remember one of them saying something about how our salvation depends on how we treat the poor. Matthew 25 says something about that.
It was a sobering experience, and after that I vowed to help the homeless/impoverished somehow.
Fast forward to when I started working the ER one year later. I grew up faster than I probably should have by starting in the ER so young. I don't regret it necessarily, but you see things that people don't normally see at 17. I lost a lot of naivety, and I also became really hardened toward certain things. Homeless people being one of them. Drunk homeless people being the majority of them. You deal with homeless people a lot in the ER. You also deal with them being drunk a lot. And, surprisingly, you don't feel like you're doing the Lord's work when you're cleaning up their urine because they tried to pee in the sink (and missed) for the 4th time. It's hard to let Jesus cross your mind when you're cursing them under your breath for grabbing at you in their drunken stupidity. You also find yourself rolling your eyes when they happen to ask for a sandwich and a blanket. I started to hate homeless people altogether.
But sometimes when I'm at work I have these moments where my jaded fog lifts and I think back to that weekend. I can look at one of my homeless patients without judgement, and I remind myself that it doesn't matter what they did or didn't do to be where they were because Jesus said "the least of these" and I think He meant it. So I try to tell myself "the least of these, Kenz, the least of these." And sometimes I say it while gritting my teeth and suppressing my anger. "The least of these, Kenz. Even the drunk, smelly least of these." Sometimes I even give them a sandwich. One time my coworkers got mad at me because I fed a homeless drunk and he came back a few hours later on the ambulance asking for another sandwich. Whoops!
I have a strong opinion that the Church tends to depend on the government to do what we as the Church are supposed to be doing. Clothe people who need clothes? The Church should be doing that. Caring for orphans? The Church should do that. Even when it comes to immigrants? The Church should welcome them. But when it comes to feeding the poor and the homeless? I would think oh... the government can do that.
So, Thursday night.
I knew for a couple of weeks that we were going to make sack lunches and hand them out to homeless people. And I tried to get pumped up about it, but honestly, I kind of dreaded it. Because I didn't want to feel burdened for them again. I wanted to detach myself and only care for them in the ER through gritted teeth and then move on. I told myself that I was doing enough. I didn't want to see them in the context of their homelessness, because I knew it would stir this part of my heart that I would have rather not stirred.
My heart was stirred.
I have never felt more like the hands and feet of Jesus than I did Thursday night. I sat back at some point and watched those college kids hand out food to smelly, homeless strangers. They just walked up to any and every homeless person we saw and said, "Hey, would you like some food?" And I thought, "Hands and feet. This is what He meant when he said we are His body. We're active, we're His hands and feet." It's not as scary or as complicated as you think--feed some people who need food. Give them coats for when they're cold and hats for their sunburnt heads and socks for their tired feet. It wasn't glamorous or showy. We handed them brown paper bags with a sandwich, cookie, chips, and water (and a handwritten note that told them that they mattered). That's it. But we fed them. We fed them. And we told them we'd be back. We didn't advertise our church, we didn't have any other agenda other than meeting their need of nourishment. It seems so petty, but it's not. It's huge. I saw Jesus so clearly in the simplicity/hugeness of what we were doing.
I cried on my drive home. Oh my goodness, my heart was softened and I hated it/loved it, so I was crying.
I saw the homeless as people who had stories and hungry bellies and not "the drunk in room 9."
I saw myself equal to them instead of better than them when I thought, "I get to eat when I'm hungry. They should, too."
I have no idea what led them to the streets. I would love to hear their stories, but to be honest, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if they're addicts or have mental illness. It matters that they're hungry and we feed them, that we give them clothes and shelter.
I hope I never forget to do what Jesus clearly tells us to do. I hope I don't settle for gritting my teeth and bearing it, for only taking care of the homeless when they're my patient in the ER and I legally have to take care of them.
I hope I don't just write in this blog. I hope I go do stuff.
I hope my heart is changed over and over again.
I hope yours is, too.
I hope we go and do things more than we sit around and talk about going and doing things. I hope we contend for something, for things that matter. I hope being the Hands and Feet is a reality that marks every part of our lives so that we bring light in the dark places, food in hungry bellies, homes for orphans, safety for widows, resources for the poor.
"Over and over, when I ask God why all of these injustices are allowed to exist in the world, I can feel the Spirit whisper to me, 'You tell me why we allow this to happen. You are my body, my hands, my feet.'"
I was going to post a picture collage of the college ministry at my church serving sack lunches to homeless people on Thursday night. Then it turned into me writing about what Thursday night did in my heart instead of posting a picture about college kids (even though those kids are awesome).
I didn't want to write this blog. I really just wanted to go to bed and push these thoughts away.
I think Jesus purposefully keeps me awake sometimes until I write. So, here we are. It's currently 1:26AM, in case you were wondering.
I used to feel so burdened for homeless people.
One time, when I was in the youth group at the church I grew up in, we were homeless for a weekend. "Plunge to Poverty." Seriously. My parents surrendered me to the church on a Friday night with a lot of the other youth kids. We were only allowed what clothes we had on. Nothing else. We had to panhandle for money. We walked all over OKC. We only ate if we had enough money to buy food (thank God for Little Caesar's $5 pizzas). It was the first weekend in December, it was freezing and drizzled and there was sleet the whole weekend. We made a fire in a trash can. We slept cuddled together in corners ( I woke up with a mouse on me. Ew). Some of the guys even slept in a dumpster, which was a great idea because, apparently, dumpsters are really warm inside.
One night we went inside the church gym for what they called the World Dinner, I think. There were different countries represented. You drew a piece of paper and went to that country's spot on the gym floor. The number of you there represented a certain 1,000 of people in that country, or something like that. Asian countries were highly populated, America had two people, etc. They served you what was an average meal for that country. I was some Asian county, I can't remember which one. But I remember that all we got was a half a cup of rice and a small amount of black coffee. That was it. And there were rules: no sharing with anyone within your country or with other countries. So when some people didn't eat their meal, for whatever reason, you had to stare at it and you couldn't eat it. Most of the countries didn't have big meals. Some had decent sized, but not too much that there were leftovers. Then there was America. Most of the other countries were sitting on the floor. America had a table. They had so much food--appetizers, main course, dessert, snacks. There were only two people at the American table. They literally could not eat everything in front of them--there was so much it was impossible. Then some people came out with trashcans, and while all of the other countries watched they dumped every piece of excess in the trash. I was starving. This is where I lost it. I cried. I was frustrated and defeated. I felt saddened for other countries who looked at us this way, or even the poor within America that looked at us the way I looked at the people at the America table. It was awful. And I cried the most because, even though it was awful, I knew at some point I would get to go home. I was so sad for people who actually lived this way but didn't have a hope of the weekend being over and getting to go home. Maybe that all seems a little dramatic, but it worked. Most of the weekend, the youth leaders took turns talking about poverty and what the Bible says about it. I remember one of them saying something about how our salvation depends on how we treat the poor. Matthew 25 says something about that.
It was a sobering experience, and after that I vowed to help the homeless/impoverished somehow.
Fast forward to when I started working the ER one year later. I grew up faster than I probably should have by starting in the ER so young. I don't regret it necessarily, but you see things that people don't normally see at 17. I lost a lot of naivety, and I also became really hardened toward certain things. Homeless people being one of them. Drunk homeless people being the majority of them. You deal with homeless people a lot in the ER. You also deal with them being drunk a lot. And, surprisingly, you don't feel like you're doing the Lord's work when you're cleaning up their urine because they tried to pee in the sink (and missed) for the 4th time. It's hard to let Jesus cross your mind when you're cursing them under your breath for grabbing at you in their drunken stupidity. You also find yourself rolling your eyes when they happen to ask for a sandwich and a blanket. I started to hate homeless people altogether.
But sometimes when I'm at work I have these moments where my jaded fog lifts and I think back to that weekend. I can look at one of my homeless patients without judgement, and I remind myself that it doesn't matter what they did or didn't do to be where they were because Jesus said "the least of these" and I think He meant it. So I try to tell myself "the least of these, Kenz, the least of these." And sometimes I say it while gritting my teeth and suppressing my anger. "The least of these, Kenz. Even the drunk, smelly least of these." Sometimes I even give them a sandwich. One time my coworkers got mad at me because I fed a homeless drunk and he came back a few hours later on the ambulance asking for another sandwich. Whoops!
I have a strong opinion that the Church tends to depend on the government to do what we as the Church are supposed to be doing. Clothe people who need clothes? The Church should be doing that. Caring for orphans? The Church should do that. Even when it comes to immigrants? The Church should welcome them. But when it comes to feeding the poor and the homeless? I would think oh... the government can do that.
So, Thursday night.
I knew for a couple of weeks that we were going to make sack lunches and hand them out to homeless people. And I tried to get pumped up about it, but honestly, I kind of dreaded it. Because I didn't want to feel burdened for them again. I wanted to detach myself and only care for them in the ER through gritted teeth and then move on. I told myself that I was doing enough. I didn't want to see them in the context of their homelessness, because I knew it would stir this part of my heart that I would have rather not stirred.
My heart was stirred.
I have never felt more like the hands and feet of Jesus than I did Thursday night. I sat back at some point and watched those college kids hand out food to smelly, homeless strangers. They just walked up to any and every homeless person we saw and said, "Hey, would you like some food?" And I thought, "Hands and feet. This is what He meant when he said we are His body. We're active, we're His hands and feet." It's not as scary or as complicated as you think--feed some people who need food. Give them coats for when they're cold and hats for their sunburnt heads and socks for their tired feet. It wasn't glamorous or showy. We handed them brown paper bags with a sandwich, cookie, chips, and water (and a handwritten note that told them that they mattered). That's it. But we fed them. We fed them. And we told them we'd be back. We didn't advertise our church, we didn't have any other agenda other than meeting their need of nourishment. It seems so petty, but it's not. It's huge. I saw Jesus so clearly in the simplicity/hugeness of what we were doing.
I cried on my drive home. Oh my goodness, my heart was softened and I hated it/loved it, so I was crying.
I saw the homeless as people who had stories and hungry bellies and not "the drunk in room 9."
I saw myself equal to them instead of better than them when I thought, "I get to eat when I'm hungry. They should, too."
I have no idea what led them to the streets. I would love to hear their stories, but to be honest, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if they're addicts or have mental illness. It matters that they're hungry and we feed them, that we give them clothes and shelter.
I hope I never forget to do what Jesus clearly tells us to do. I hope I don't settle for gritting my teeth and bearing it, for only taking care of the homeless when they're my patient in the ER and I legally have to take care of them.
I hope I don't just write in this blog. I hope I go do stuff.
I hope my heart is changed over and over again.
I hope yours is, too.
I hope we go and do things more than we sit around and talk about going and doing things. I hope we contend for something, for things that matter. I hope being the Hands and Feet is a reality that marks every part of our lives so that we bring light in the dark places, food in hungry bellies, homes for orphans, safety for widows, resources for the poor.
"Over and over, when I ask God why all of these injustices are allowed to exist in the world, I can feel the Spirit whisper to me, 'You tell me why we allow this to happen. You are my body, my hands, my feet.'"
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