Joyful Transformation

I lead a very sheltered life. But, I am comfortable here, surely I am not meant to get out in the highways and byways and deal with people who live differently, am I? I mean sure I want to be about living for Jesus and feeding the hungry, visiting the sick and the imprisoned and all that, but I can do that by tossing a few dollars towards people who are actually trained for this….can’t I?

Yesterday on the heels of my post about how I deserved a vacation, I went on a little trip. The trip was to a little place called reality. I have mentioned before that I am on the board for the local Habitat for Humanity. Since I deal with people applying for home loans everyday, the board felt that I should head up the “selection committee”. Me and another committee member went for a “home visit” to one of the finalist in our selection. Here a single mom is raising two pre-teen boys on a daily pay of about what it takes for me to fill up my SUV. She lives in a trailer that I was literally afraid to walk through for fear of my feet going through the floor. There was one spot in the older son’s bedroom where the floor had actually fallen through. Her landlord had told her to put a board over it; he would try to get to it soon. That was at Christmas. The front glass in the door is broken out and one of the bathrooms doesn’t work. She does not have a bedroom, but sleeps on a mattress on the living room floor. This is after working 40 to 50 hours a week on her feet. Poverty, sub-standard housing and lack of training to make the most of what she does have…right under my nose, right under the nose of a town that has a church or two in every square mile of the county; how could this be?

God wouldn’t let me sleep with this last night. I went to bed at 10:30 and woke up at 11:15. At 12:15 I just got up, I lurked on many of your blogs and tried to find the peace to return to sleep. It didn’t happen. I can run, but I can’t hide. My sin is before me; my sin of complacency, my sin of short sightedness, my sin of a hard heart. In the midst of the filth of the living situation I was ashamed of the way I was thinking. “How hard is it to be clean’? “She should at least be doing the best she can with what she has!” You know what? She probably was.

God has blessed my life. Sure I have worked hard, and I have never really been without a job. But I have been blessed with a wonderful husband who shared my dedication to being a “good worker”. I am blessed with a level of intelligence that has helped me make good choices and was blessed with parents who loved me and while they were never very far from poverty themselves they taught us to take pride in our home and our belongings. Not everyone has that. And while it seems natural to you and me it is very possibly a life style that has to be taught to someone who has never lived like that.

Yesterday, even before the sleepless night, I had resolved to be a disciple of Jesus. I am going to quit being the follower who lingers at the edge of the crowd looking for another miracle, another blessing. I am going to be a disciple. I am going to be finding the loaves and fishes and serving them to the crowd. I am going to be there picking up the pieces when the feast is over. I am going to have to get down there with the same people that Jesus associated with. I have a lot of preconceived notions to overcome. But I know that God can fill my heart and change me.

Would you join me? Will you truly follow Jesus?