It was an unusually cold day for the month of May. Spring
had arrived
and everything was alive with color. But a cold front
from the north
had brought winter's chill back to Indiana. I sat with
two friends in the
picture window of a quaint restaurant just off the corner
of the town
square.
The food and the company were both especially good that
day. As we
talked, my attention was drawn outside, across the street.
There,
walking into town, was a man who appeared to be carrying all
his worldly
goods on his back. He was carrying a well-worn sign that read,
"I will work for food."
My heart sank. I brought him to the attention of my friends
and noticed
that others around us had stopped eating to focus on him.
Heads moved
in a mixture of sadness and disbelief. We continued with our
meal, but
his image lingered in my mind. We finished
our meal and went our
separate
ways. I had errands to do and quickly set out
to accomplish them. I
glanced toward the town square, looking somewhat half-heartedly
for the
strange visitor. I was fearful, knowing that seeing him again
would call
for some response. I drove through town and saw nothing of
him. I made
some purchases at a store and got back in my car. Deep within
me, the
Spirit of God kept speaking to me: "Don't go back to
the office until
you've at least driven once more around the square."
And so, with some
hesitancy, I headed back into town. As I turned the
square's third corner,
I saw him.
He was standing on the steps of the stone-front church, going
through
his sack. I stopped and looked, feeling both compelled
to speak to him,
yet
wanting to drive on. The empty parking space on the corner
seemed to be a
sign from God: an invitation to park. I pulled in, got
out and approached
the town's newest visitor.
"Looking for the pastor?" I asked.
"Not really," he replied. "Just resting."
"Have you eaten today?"
"Oh, I ate something early this morning."
"Would you like to have lunch with me?"
"Do you have some work I could do for you?"
"No work," I replied. "I commute here to work from the city,
but I would
like to take you to lunch."
"Sure," he replied with a smile. As he began to gather his
things, I asked
some surface questions.
"Where you headed?"
"St. Louis."
"Where you from?"
"Oh, all over; mostly Florida."
"How long you been walking?"
"Fourteen years," came the reply.
I knew I had met someone unusual. We sat across from each
other in the
same restaurant I had left only minutes earlier. His hair
was long and
straight, and he had a neatly trimmed dark beard. His skin
was deeply
tanned, and his face was weathered slightly beyond his 38
years.
His eyes were dark yet clear, and he spoke with an eloquence
and
articulation that was startling. He removed his jacket to
reveal a
bright red T-shirt that said, "Jesus is The Never Ending
Story."
Then Daniel's story began to unfold. He had seen rough times
early in
life. He'd made some wrong choices and reaped the consequences.
Fourteen years earlier, while backpacking across the country,
he had
stopped on the beach in Daytona. He tried to hire on with
some men who
were putting up a large tent and some equipment. A concert,
he thought.
He was hired, but the tent would not house a concert but revival
services,
and in those services he saw life more clearly. He gave his
life over to
God.
"Nothing's been the same since," he said. "I felt the Lord
telling me to
keep walking, and so I did, some 14 years now."
"Ever think of stopping?" I asked.
"Oh, once in a while, when it seems to get the best of me.
But God has
given me this calling. I give out Bibles. That's what's in
my sack. I work
to buy food and Bibles, and I give them out when His Spirit
leads."
I sat amazed. My homeless friend was not homeless. He was
on a mission and
lived this way by choice. The question burned inside for a
moment and then
I
asked:
"What's it like?"
"What?"
"To walk into a town carrying all your things on your back
and to show your
sign?"
"Oh, it was humiliating at first. People would stare and make
comments.
Once someone tossed a piece of half-eaten bread and made a
gesture that
certainly didn't make me feel welcome. But then it became
humbling to
realize that God was using me to touch lives and change people's
concepts of other folks like me."
My concept was changing too. We finished our dessert and gathered
his
things.
Just outside the door he paused. He turned to me and said,
"Come, ye
blessed
of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the
foundation of
the world:
For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty,
and ye gave me
drink: I
was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me:
I was sick,
and ye
visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me."
I felt as if we were on holy ground. "Could you use another
Bible?" I
asked.
He said he preferred a certain translation. It traveled well
and was not
too heavy. It was also his personal favorite. "I've read through
it 14
times," he said. "I'm not sure we've got one of those,
but let's stop by
our
church and see."
I was able to find my new friend a Bible that would do
well, and he seemed
very grateful.
"Where you headed from here?" I asked.
"Well, I found this little map on the back of this amusement
park coupon."
"Are you hoping to hire on there for a while?"
"No, I just figure I should go there. I figure someone under
that star
right there needs a Bible, so that's where I'm going next."
He smiled, and
the warmth of his spirit radiated the sincerity of his mission.
I drove him back to the town square where we'd met two hours
earlier, and
as we drove, it started raining. We parked and unloaded his
things.
"Would you sign my autograph book?" he asked. "I like to keep
messages from
folks I meet.
I wrote in his little book that his commitment to his calling
had touched
my life. I encouraged him to stay strong. And I left
him with a verse of
scripture, Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the thoughts that
I think toward
you,"
saith the LORD, "thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give
you an
expected end."
"Thanks, man," he said. "I know we just met and we're
really just
strangers, but
I love you."
"I know," I said. "I love you, too."
"The Lord is good."
"Yes. He is."
"How long has it been since someone hugged you?" I asked.
"A long time," he replied. And so on the busy street corner
in the
drizzling rain, my new friend and I embraced, and I
felt deep inside that
I
had been changed. He put his things on his back, smiled his
winning smile
and
said, "See you in the New Jerusalem." "I'll be there!" was
my reply.
He began his journey again. He headed away with his sign dangling
from his
bedroll and pack of Bibles. He stopped, turned and said,
"When you see
something
that makes you think of me, will you pray for me?"
"You bet," I shouted back. "God bless."
"God bless." And that was the last I saw of him. Late that
evening as I
left my office, the wind blew strong. The cold front had settled
hard
upon the town. I bundled up and hurried to my car.
As I sat back and
reached for the emergency brake, I saw them-a pair of well-worn
brown work
gloves neatly laid over the length of the handle. I picked
them up and
thought
of my friend and wondered if his hands would stay warm that
night without
them.
I remembered his words: "If you see something that makes you
think of me,
will you pray for me?" Today his gloves lie on my desk
in my office. They
help me to see the world and its people in a new
way, and they help me
remember those two hours with my unique friend and to pray
for his
ministry.
"See you in the New Jerusalem," he said. Yes Daniel, I know I will.
Addendum...
James 2:1-5 My brethren, have not the faith of our
Lord Jesus Christ, the
Lord of glory, with respect of persons. For if there
come unto your
assembly
a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come
in also a poor
man
in vile raiment; And ye have respect to him that weareth
the gay clothing,
and
say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the
poor, Stand
thou there,
or sit here under my footstool: Are ye not then partial in
yourselves, and
are
become judges of evil thoughts? Hearken, my beloved
brethren, Hath not
God chosen
the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom
which he
hath promised
to them that love him?
author unknown