the five-ten

Yesterday, as I was preparing for our church’s (Convergence Oakland) life group meeting in the evening, I felt dissonance.  Incongruence.

We’ve been slowly going through the the book “Crazy Love” by Francis Chan, and much of what we had studied up to now has focused on diagnosing our lives, and trying to make sense of it in light of the Gospel we believe in.  A lot of our studies were filled with conviction of being lukewarm Christians, of not giving God our first fruits but rather our spoiled rotten compost, and of being a people obsessed with the utterly useless and inconsequential things of this world.  

So, as the calendar would have it, I was preparing for us to study Chapter 9, which is this chapter which takes all of the teaching before and sums it up, in the form of life stories of people who’ve given their lives to the mission of God.  These short biographies were just inspiring and stretching, and yet, made sense in light of the person’s belief.  

There was a story about a person whose heart was for unreached tribes.  She positioned her entire life around hoping to met them one day, despite this tribe having killed every outsider that approached them.  Another was about a music artist who was a huge commercial success - though he never knew it because all the profits were channeled through his church and redistributed to those in need.  Still another was about a doctor who had given his life to helping people in Ethiopia, and when he got a toothache and had to leave the region for treatment, he requested that all his teeth get replaced with dentures so he wouldn’t ever have to leave his mission field again for the same ailment.

They were “radical” only to those who didn’t understand the reason why.  Chapter 9 is titled “Who Really Lives That Way?”.  

Who does? I don’t.  We don’t. 

So I was sitting there going through the study guide, which had hypothetical questions about the challenges of living in a “radical” manner.  What might go through your mind if you were to serve in this manner?  What challenges might you face?  Why might you not do what God was calling them to do?

This past week, God had also been putting Proverbs 21:13 on my heart.  The verse goes: “Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered.”  It had never occurred to me that our prayer lives - our requests and cries out to God - could be affected by our mentality towards the materially and spiritually poor.  It’d been stewing inside of me, waiting for the right time to boil over.  

I knew at that time that we couldn’t just comfortably sit around in our living room that evening, on a rare cold and rainy night in Oakland, and talk about doing something, when we could actually be doing something.  I figured that many of the questions the study guide posed could be answered by putting ourselves out there and trying, if even for a couple hours, to love in a manner Jesus did.  I quickly sent out an update to those that would be attending the life group that night, just a few hours before it was scheduled to start.

And we decided, and by “we” I mean I, that we would cook up (and this time “we” means my fantastic wife, Laura) a few meals and find some homeless people to give them to.  But, we wanted to try to care for them not only in a material sense, but in a spiritual sense.  We only cooked 12 meals to distribute, since we wanted to leave time for opportunities to pray for those we met on the streets.  

We set out in teams of 3 with a simple agenda:  Offer some food.  Learn their name.  Hear their story.  Pray for them.

At our first stop, there was a barricade of about 4 shopping carts, near a covered corner of a self-storage building.  As we walked up, the situation was a bit awkward.  2 people were getting ready to sleep, on makeshift bedding that totaled a full size bed.  We would meet Sam & Tricia, who didn’t seem to be sleeping near each other for romantic reasons but more so to share the warmth.  Sam wanted prayer to be off the streets.  Tricia wanted safety for her grandchildren, as her son was on trial for murder.

Hae’Ag pushed her shopping cart along in a steadfast manner, clearly in a routine of “life”.  She lost her boyfriend 7 months ago and had been on and off the streets for 20 years.  Her vest looked completely drenched through, and yet she smiled a lot, unafraid to show a mouth that had more teeth missing than intact.  It isn’t often you see a Korean on the streets, but I guess if you were to see one somewhere, it would be in the diversity of Oakland.  She was smiling as Laura prayed for her.

Cliff had a stroke 6 months ago that at the time had left one entire side of him paralyzed.  His family was far away in Texas.  

Anthony hadn’t seen his son in more than a decade.  Yet I was encouraged when we asked him he if wanted prayer.  ”Let’s do this,” was his simple response, as he constantly scanned the street, his bike, and his backpack.

Tanya had a gentle and polite spirit about her.  She looked “young” for being homeless.  Her kids were in Mississippi.  Kathy prayed for her safety and family reconciliation on an overpass with the traffic of I-980 rushing below us, our faces illuminated in pulses by the hazard lights from the car.

The last stop of the night was the local supermarket where we met Tumbles.  Tumbles, like a tumbleweed, was exactly how she introduced herself.  I wondered which came first, her name or her situation.  I pegged Tumbles in her mid or late 20’s or so, with a rather polite spirit.  She was soft-spoken, and had steady eyes.  Her dad, Andrew, has cancer, and she was more than willing to receive prayer.  While Craig was praying, one of Tumbles’ friend came up rather unexpectedly and interrupted.  He introduced himself as Jesse, and while I couldn’t tell if he had come up to “protect” Tumbles or just out of curiosity, I do know that by the time Craig had resumed and finished praying for Tumbles he had his arms around both of them.

We said our “good evenings” as Tumbles backed away and started towards her group.  She turned around one last time.

“Later on…if you have time…”

It took me a second to grasp what she was saying.

“My dad, Andrew.  Pray for him.”  Dear Lord, heal Andrew.

2 hours after we started, we were finally out of food.  We had only given out 12 servings.  Most of the people we met were within about a half mile radius of where our church services are held.  Almost all were receptive to prayer.

Afterwards, a few of us were able to reflect on the experience.  Heartbreaking.  Eye-opening.  Humbling.  Blessing.  And there was that moment that we’ve experienced in a lot of our ministries at Convergence - where we end up being the ones that are changed and blessed, when we had set out to do the opposite.

I’m grateful for a life group that was willing to take a chance.  Willing to bask in the awkward conversation for an evening in uncomfortable conditions, while themselves battling various states of hunger and physical ailment.

I’m hoping that we can head out more often in the future, to make events like this less “significant” and “special” and more routine and ordinary.  Craig alluded to it on the way back saying “if only what was radical became the norm.”  Amen.

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