Breaking Bread with Statistics

I almost didn't get where I was trying to go last night.  I had a big crock full of dinner for 16 people, but when I drove up to the building, it was dark.  I guess I didn't get the memo that the location had changed.

For several years, our family has volunteered with Interfaith Hospitality Network, whose mission is to serve homeless families in crisis by providing shelter, meals, and many other gracious services.  I partner with someone every 6 weeks or so to make a meal, serve it, and eat with the families.  

I panicked last night when I realized I didn't have anyone's phone number.  My meal partner was a stranger. I couldn't get a hold of the coordinator or the office.  My husband sat at his work desk, trying to find old messages in my gmail account that would give a clue to which of the 20 or so host churches they could be meeting.  

"Gracie, let's pray," I said, and she dutifully started pleading, "God, help us get where we need to go so we can feed these families."  

And then one call led to another to another, and we were blasting off to the right church.  Grace and I looked at each other, eyes shining.  "God did that," I whispered, and she bent her sweet little head and thanked Him.    

Twenty minutes late, we walked into a room rampant with toddler screams and children racing in circles, with parents on their last nerve.  I dished out the food as quickly as possible and suddenly, calm was restored.  Grace and I looked around for where to sit.  The tables were pretty full, so we could have sat at an empty one, but I've learned it's better to just squeeze in with the families and do what you can to be an encouragement.  

So we adjusted some chairs and joined a hodgepodge of kids and adults.  Two of the little girls were around Grace's age, and it took the three of them all of 5 minutes to decide they were friends and to plan what they would do when the meal was over.  First doll house, then hide and seek, then board games.  Grace and I couldn't get enough of 3-yr-old Micah, who was the spittin' image of Rudy Huckstable from the Cosby Show.  

I spent the remainder of the evening talking with the big barrel of a man across the table about his street-tough beginnings, the price he continues to pay for his past, his sold-out love for Jesus, and his deep longing to get his life turned around and provide for his wife and little girls.  In a place that often has a spirit of heaviness, where people are very reluctant to open up to a stranger, he was such a bright and hopeful spirit.  It's the difference vibrant faith makes.  

What I love about serving struggling and marginalized people is that you lose labels and categories and you realize that they are just people like you.  Their eyes hold pain mingled with hope.  After a season of political drama and people on their polarized high horses, it was good to be breaking bread with the "statistics."  I don't want to misrepresent myself though.  I spend the majority of time in my comfy house with my homogenous group of friends, or carting my kids to their activities.  I could do SO much more, and there are amazing people who pour out their lives for others in ways that leave me speechless.

Church, let's get our hands dirty.  

Stop complaining about the government, and just be Christ to someone.  Stop with the ideological discussions on how best to rescue the masses, or worse, let them flounder on their own, and invest some time and money in a few lives here and abroad.  That's my prayer for us, for me.