| |
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 halfheartedly for the
strange visitor.
I was fearful, knowing that seeing him again would call
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 storefront 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 earlier. 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 and inherit the
kingdom I've
prepared for you. For when I was hungry you gave me food,
when I
was thirsty you gave me drink, a stranger and you took me
in."
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?"
"Well, I found this little map on the back of
this amusement park
coupon."
"Are you hoping to hire on there for awhile?"
"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, in
Jeremiah,
"I know the plans I have for you," declared the
Lord, "plans to
prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a
future and
a hope."
"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 bed roll 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
make 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....
~Author
Unknown~
|