Often I read something I wish I had written. My friend Bob Shrum in South Carolina talks about a couple of people who knocked on their church's door lately. It is a hard time for a lot of people. As we move through cut-backs and lay-offs and our own worries about 401K's--we need to remember the human faces of where we are. My friend observes:
"She is a grandmother who just got laid off from her job. She came into our offices a week ago...and was embarrassed to be here. Living in her house with her was her daughter who had, also, been laid off from her job and her granddaughter. She was caught in a place where many have been caught. She had always worked, but they had to live from paycheck to paycheck, and there was no money. She was not getting unemployment (there's this process you have to go through) and she had not yet qualified for food stamps. In addition to food and keeping the heat going, they needed toilet paper and feminine products neither of which you can get with food stamps even if she had them. She apologized over and over for being here.
Then there was the young lady from Charlotte who had just moved to these parts from Virginia. She and her sick husband were living in a motel. She did house cleaning and a couple of folks had promised her some work, but it hadn't started yet. She just didn't want to get kicked out on the street because she was two days behind in her rent. Could we help, she asked? She had called several churches in the Charlotte area, but no one had returned her calls she said."
God bless all the people out there that are hurting and help us to keep our eyes open to them as we move through this day. Amen.
As a young man at the Hillcrest Baptist Church in Enterprise, Al. a deacon was giving a finance report. He said, "We have $300 in benevolence but thankfully we didn't have to spend any of it."
ReplyDeleteI think it's time to spend it.