On the Missio Dei

People from the Plunge

This is the second installment of "People from the Plunge," a post written by LFC's very own Urban Plunge alum, Jeff Nichols.

A refuge in times of trouble

Homeless man walks through pain and deception to find truth and God's perfect peace.

If you’re gonna go, go now! While heads are turned, folks are busy. Nobody seems to care.

Scurry into this uptown Charlotte eatery – the one you’ve been living in front of since you got off the bus three days ago – and use the bathroom while you can. Get in, then back to your bench in front of a place, for mercy’s sake, named Rock Bottom.

Which reminds you, Gary Johnson, what is left of your measly three packs of Vienna sausages and three packs of crackers, the only food you brought with you on that Greyhound from Winston-Salem?

And speaking of rock bottom, where did you leave off in that familiar downward spiral of rumination, thoughts pestering and whispering nonstop? Oh yeah, the pick-up time. Like you were saying, you arrived at the bus stop here on time, right? You, you’re never late. Daddy, the no-nonsense tobacco farmer, made sure of that.

Then where was the guy who was supposed to pick you up? The one with the blessed job?! Why wasn’t he there when he said? Don’t know. Don’t know what to do now either, do you? Should you walk back in the direction of the bus stop? Toward those disheveled, scary-looking people you ran away from? Wait, why are you thinking that? You know you’re every bit as homeless as they are. No job. Check. No food. Check. No home. Check. You qualify.

At whom do we shake our fists in times like these? How do we climb off the bottom?

Where do we find truth?

 

The fall

Here’s a lie. This white powder.

Gary Johnson is sitting across the table from it. This is back in the ’70s at N.C. Central University. On the other side is the man who is introducing Gary to cocaine. None other than one of his professors.

“Lord have mercy, it nearly ruined my life,” Gary says. “I’d never drank, never tried drugs of any kind. But I trusted him. He said, ‘Try it, it’s not going to hurt you.’”

The fall to rock bottom often turns on a moment like this one. When Gary thinks back on his hard and joyous life, he what-ifs for all its worth that one temptation that led to decades of addiction. What if? What if?

When you’re homeless – as Gary is as you read this – there’s time to ponder and analyze. You sift through confusion. Remember hope. Push away pain.

He blinks and sees himself just out of N.C. Central, putting his degree in music education to good use as a public school music teacher. And man how Gary loves children. To this day, nothing makes him smile wider. And that’s why, back then, he keeps putting the brakes on each new teaching gig. Keeps moving on.

Because he knows the truth. “At every new job, I thought I could change, but it was the same old story. I was a cocaine addict. It killed me to know I was giving those kids only half a teacher.”

Still, Gary nearly always had a job. Always had a roof over his head.

Until he didn’t.

 

Angel watch

Even she looks like a lie. Or at least someone else to fear. This lady walking down the Winston-Salem railroad tracks near the homeless camp.

Gary can’t explain exactly why he used to hide from this woman when he found himself homeless for the first time in his life about 15 years ago. Reality bends and wobbles on the road to rock bottom. You begin to question what you’re processing until so much of what you see – or think you see – is like the haze rising from the street on a hot summer day.

Before he wound up out here by the tracks, he’d found a job in Winston-Salem at R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. Imagine that. As a boy, he’d worked long, hard hours in the family tobacco fields in eastern North Carolina, even missing parts of school days in the fall to make sure the golden leaves were hanging in the barn before the first frost. Now as a man he found himself in a brand new career employed by one of the world’s largest cigarette makers.

And, something else, he’d found a church to attend. One that needed a piano player. “Except for the fact that I was still addicted to cocaine, that was the most grounded I’d been in a long time,” Gary says. “I thought I was going to be OK. I thought I was home.”

But as consumer demand for cigarettes weakened, RJR began to downsize. Gary was soon out of a job. When he couldn’t find a new one, he eventually lost his apartment. When he couldn’t afford gas, he sold the car he’d been living in.

Gary Johnson was homeless. Living near an overpass out by the railroad with a backpack and two blankets. Hiding from that woman, who would seem to show up out of nowhere. Until one day she spotted Gary before he could duck, and called out to him.

“She said, ‘Hey, come to my house and clean up. You can take a shower, iron your clothes and we can talk about what you’re doing here.’ This was one of the first times when I began to understand that there are people in this world who do care. I was still homeless, but I had somewhere to go. I didn’t have to tell my church. Didn’t have to tell my family.”

The thought of opening up to his family – or asking them for help – scared Gary to death. He’d never wanted anything more than to make his mother and father proud. And up until recently, he was 100 percent convinced that not only were they not proud, they somehow no longer loved him. Life unravels; truth bends and wobbles.

Or does it?

 

Spirit wind

Not the policeman. Oh come on, him too?

Gary says he was passing the day in front of the uptown Holiday Inn on College Street earlier this year when a man in street clothes asked him if he needed anything to eat. Gary declined. The man asked again and Gary again said no. When he asked a third time, Gary relented and told the man that, if he insisted, he honestly wouldn’t mind a hotdog and drink from a nearby street vendor. And with that, the undercover officer took him to jail for the night. Gary said other homeless men were there too, targets of an apparent crackdown on panhandling in the long run-up to September’s Democratic National Convention in the Queen City.

Gary can only shake his head at the memory, but he does so with an ever-present smile that is part of his persona now. It’s a joy that shines through as he shares his life story to visitors inside the Urban Ministry Center on North Tryon Street, the interfaith organization serving the poor and the homeless that Gary was introduced to years ago when he ran out of food and grew tired of running in and out of Rock Bottom.

“I came down here and was amazed that I could take a shower, wash my clothes, get something to eat,” he says. “The staff smiled at me and told me everything was going to be alright. This was where I first started to get a glimpse of how somebody in my situation could be OK and still count for something. I was beginning to understand.”

And so Gary’s life moved forward. Promises of jobs and housing would float in like a feather, then catch the wind of misfortune and drift upward again, away from the bottom, out of reach. Still Gary was beginning to see God at work in his life. Not always in the most clearly defined ways, but just the hope that there might bea way to truth, through any circumstance, was beginning to settle – and stir about – in his soul.

He was beginning to put the pieces together, even through more hard times. Like the two-year jail stint several years ago. Hard to do, but it led to finally kicking the cocaine habit he’d battled since college. He walked out truly a free man. But in no time at all, more struggle when he was hit by a car while crossing the street. In this world, you will have trouble. Gary could testify.

But, goodness, what about the kind-hearted people carrying out Jesus’ call to love the least of these? Folks like that lady by the railroad tracks. The waiter at Rock Bottom who brought out some food late one night. Barbara at Urban Ministry, who told him over and over that his past did not equal his future. And his regular customer at the Denny’s on Sunset Boulevard, who tracked Gary down when he didn’t show up for his shift on Christmas Eve four years ago.

The customer had planned all along to take Gary back to her house that night and hook up the lifelong Tar Heels fan with more UNC gear than he’d ever seen. But mainly she wanted him to know that there was room for him in her house on Christmas Eve.

She eventually found Gary crying behind a Bojangles’ dumpster on West Boulevard. She took him home and listened to Gary pour out his heart, piercing that silent night with a story about a man who didn’t feel loved. He hadn’t received a Christmas card, as others had at Urban Ministry. That was it. For goodness’ sake, even his mother and father were no longer to be trusted?

It was as though he’d been riding around, figuratively speaking, in a station wagon full of luggage. Full of hurt. And he’d suddenly slammed on the brakes and felt the full weight of that baggage slap him in the back of the head. As depressed as he’d ever been, he failed to show up for work and lost his job at Denny’s.

But he was about to connect with a local family, one Gary will tell you was heaven-sent.

 

Higher ground

Who knows how many lives have been blessed by Room in the Inn, the annual partnership between Urban Ministry and area churches, schools and YMCAs. Add Gary Johnson to the long list. A few years ago, he was one of a dozen or so men and women from Urban Ministry who found their way one winter evening to an overnight stay at Trinity United Methodist Church on Beatties Ford Road.

He spent time talking to several of the Room in the Inn volunteers from the church and the pastor. And when morning came, he wondered how he would ever leave. He’d eaten well. Showered. Slept soundly. But nothing compared to the love he felt from the people at Trinity. He was beside himself. He still is.

“I’ve never been the same since,” he said. “I mean, I just couldn’t believe it. How in the world could they treat me just like I was one of them? I kind of walked around in a daze. I found a family there.”

And Trinity United Methodist found a piano player. Every Sunday now, Gary takes a downtown bus up to North Charlotte where someone picks him up and takes him up to church, always an hour early, “or I feel like I’m late,” Gary says. The congregation loves him, none more than the children who run up to him as soon as he arrives, taking him back in his mind to those days when Gary the music teacher lived for children and fostering their love of music.

Gary was blown away a couple of years ago to be invited along with 70 men from Trinity on a retreat to Bethelwoods in York, S.C., the most transformative experience of his life. The theme: Give your burdens away. Lay them down at Jesus’ feet.

Gary witnessed many around him doing just that. “Never saw so many men crying in my life,” he said. He opened up to God that weekend like never before, accepting His forgiveness. Then he forgave those who had deceived him. And finally, he forgave himself.

“I decided that, you know what, maybe God has allowed me to be homeless. There’s a reason for everything that’s happened to me. I mean, I’ve really been an inspiration and a help to so many homeless people around here, I know that. And I’ve had a chance to share with many people at my church about what it’s like to be homeless, too. I know they hear me.”

And just when it seemed as though his joy, this living water, would spill over during that Bethelwoods weekend, someone handed him a surprise letter. A letter from home. And then Gary wept, too.

“My mom wrote that they were proud of me, and that’s all I’ve ever wanted to hear. To know they love me. I felt so lifted up. And my father signed it, too. And then to also really realize and believe that God loves me and He’s doing something with my life, too? Ever since then, I haven’t stopped feeling good about me. I know the truth now. I’m still walking high off the ground.”

And nowhere near rock bottom.

 

Editor’s note: The Urban Plunge is essentially a three-day mission trip – to Charlotte. You visit several of our missio Dei partner organizations to see how God and God’s people minister to those in need…and join them in their work. In the occasional series People from the Plunge, we’ll introduce you to some of the folks we’ve met along the way and see how God is at work in their lives. Names are sometimes changed for privacy.

Founded in 1994, the Urban Ministry Center is an interfaith organization that serves poor and homeless people with love and compassion and in numerous tangible ways. For more information, visitwww.urbanministrycenter.org. 

 

 

People from the Plunge

Editor’s note: The Urban Plunge is essentially a three-day mission trip – to Charlotte. You visit several of our missio Dei partner organizations to see how God and God’s people minister to those in need…and join them in their work. In the occasional series People from the Plunge, we’ll introduce you to some of the folks we’ve met along the way and see how God is at work in their lives. Names are sometimes changed for privacy.

His mercies are new every morning

 By Jeff Nichols

…weep with those who weep. Romans 12:15

CHARLOTTE – It’s 6:30 a.m., Oct. 21, the first real chilly morning of fall. A new dawn of desperation for Elizabeth McDaniel who waits in the dark at a West Boulevard bus stop.

She checks her portable oxygen. Gets a tighter grasp on her folded up power bill, bank statement and Social Security papers.

Her destination on this Friday morning is Crisis Assistance Ministry on Spratt Street, an emergency financial assistance agency with a mission to prevent evictions and utility disconnections. She’ll wait in a long line with dozens of others for one reason.

Her power is about to be turned off.

Not on some yet to be determined day next month. Or next week. Or maybe Monday so she can at least get through the weekend.

It will happen today. As in, by 5 p.m. this very afternoon.

The name “Crisis Assistance Ministry” is not hyperbole. And so Elizabeth McDaniel isn’t thinking about a restful weekend as she arrives at the agency and begins the slow roll in her walker chair toward the locked door – and a decision on the other side. As the sun rises higher and the line grows longer, the anxiety that comes with crisis wades through her soul. Will 8 a.m. – when the doors are opened – ever get here?

“I’m trying not to worry, but it’s hard not to. I’m just praying that me and my tank won’t end up in a hospital tonight,” she says. “But if they turn off my power, I don’t know where else I’d go.”

The “tank” is Elizabeth’s primary oxygen tank at home. She has numerous breathing difficulties brought on by bronchitis, emphysema, sleep apnea “and everything else you can name,” she says.

So, in Elizabeth’s home, power means more than light and comfort. It’s her very breath.

Take the money and run

 She just kept on going. With Elizabeth’s 111 bucks in her pocket.

 On a particularly bad morning a few months ago when Elizabeth couldn’t get out of bed, she took her son’s girlfriend up on an offer to pay her power bill for her.

Nobody has heard from the young woman since.

“She took my money that morning and just kept on going,” Elizabeth said. “Why would she do that? I don’t know. But it hurt.”

 And it caused Elizabeth, for the first time in her life, to miss a utilities payment. Worse, she slid into an all too common “falling dominoes” predicament experienced by the poor and those on fixed incomes. For many of these folks, there is no savings account, no such thing as an “emergency fund” when things go awry. No loans from friends or relatives or banks.

There is just enough money for each month. Period. So one missed payment leads to more missed payments. Then the late fees, past due notices and phone calls come in as if orchestrated by some uncaring force meant for harm.

And before you know it, you’re waiting in line at Crisis Assistance Ministry, worried mostly about “one little piece of paper.”

“They say they need a copy of my lease and I wasn’t able to find that,” Elizabeth says. “I’ve got everything else right here in my hand, but I’m so nervous about this lease. After all I’ve done been through, this might come down to one little piece of paper. I’ve prayed for strength. I’ve prayed that I won’t get in that door and find out they can’t help me.”

 

Nowhere to turn

As you might expect in a time of ongoing economic turmoil, the number of folks forced to rely on Crisis Assistance Ministry for emergency assistance continues to climb. Much of the problem stems from the working poor’s inability to earn living wages and the lack of affordable housing.

According to the 2010 North Carolina Living Income Standard, a family of two adults and two children must earn $48,814 annually – an amount equal to 221 percent of the federal poverty level – to afford the actual costs of seven essential expenses: housing, food, childcare, health care, transportation, taxes and other necessities (like clothing, personal care items, household supplies, school supplies and local telephone service).

To meet that level, the adults in the average four-person family would need to earn a combined $23.47 per hour and work 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year.

The minimum wage in North Carolina, however, is only $7.25 an hour or $1,160 per month (less than $14,000 annually), resulting in a huge shortfall.

This shortfall is why many folks like Elizabeth (she has another family member living with her) find themselves juggling bills and expenses every month. Too often, this results in an unpaid energy bill, a hungry child or an eviction notice.

With nowhere else to turn, that shortfall sends people down to wait in line at Crisis Assistance. The agency’s focus is to “stop the bleeding” by working to prevent eviction and utility loss in order to keep people in stable living environments. It works to address longer-term issues through relationships with partner agencies in the community.

The agency also provides clothing and household items free of charge to people in need. It receives roughly half of its funding from Mecklenburg County and half from private donations.

 Crisis Assistance places no limit on the number of visits for emergency financial assistance, though there is a dollar amount restriction.

 

On time God

At about 8:45, Elizabeth emerges with great news. She was approved. Crisis Assistance will cut a check and send it to the power company.

Elizabeth has a chance now to catch up. She smiles widely as she leans on the walker and shuffles slowly toward the bus stop. Toward a weekend with light and heat and a future she knows is in God’s hands. 

“He’s the one who’s brought me this far. Not just this morning, he’s always been good to me. Always.”

 

For more information on Crisis Assistance Ministry, visit www.crisisassistance.org. More than 10 percent of Mecklenburg County’s population lives in poverty.

 

Taking the Plunge...and changing a life.

In May, a team of Lake Forest Church members embarked on a three-day journey...to Uptown Charlotte. During the Urban Plunge, they lived, served and worshipped together in the city as they uncovered how God is at work in our own backyard through our missio Dei partner organizations.

One of these partners is Love INC (In the Name of Christ), an organization that seeks to mobilize area churches to reach out to hurting people in the name and with the love of Christ. Their mission is simple: In the Name of Christ, to link people with unmet needs with church members willing to meet those needs in such a way that both will be pleased.

During this Plunge, LFC team members worked to build a ramp at the home of a woman...and the results, quite simply, changed her life. Below is a reflection from one of the team members, Teresa Chelko, followed by a story from the ramp recipient - Ms. Karen L. Smith.

FROM TERESA CHELKO:
To take an urban plunge when you live in the suburbs can be huge leap. How can that be when you can
get in your car and drive right through the area you are going to stop and stay in for a few days? 

If you have expectations it is really the unexpected that gets you.

The bonding that takes place with the group of people you share this experience with is a treasure all of its own.
Not really knowing what we would do but being told to be flexible no matter what happens sets the stage to...JUST BE OPEN.

We observed, learned, shared, served and studied a book in the Bible. 

It all came together as we were given the opportunity to work on a project with Love INC to build a 32-ft wheelchair ramp of a wonderful lady that finds herself having a hard time getting in and out of her home health complications.  Arriving at Karen's home we were eager to introduce ourselves and get to work.  Love INC had provided us with a master carpenter that told us each step to take.  We quickly jumped in to the tasks at hand, each finding what we felt comfortable doing.   We had to start with demolition of the front porch railings.  We were so excited we began to cheer with each step being accomplished. There were not enough tasks to keep all 9 of us busy so we found time to clean up the front yard and refine two natural areas.  Helping to make our ramp building a complete overhaul to Karen's home.

We found that taking the time to visit with Karen was just as valuable as our great building skills.  She is a lady that has lived a lot of life and finds herself eager for company and grateful for help.  We went to build a ramp and left with a heart for a special lady who touched us all with her desire to thank us and share some of herself with each of us.

FROM MS. SMITH:
How can mere words ever be enough to say thank you to Love INC, Steve Parrot and the wonderful volunteers from Lake Forest Church, Huntersville.  I was blessed with their presence on Saturday, May 28, by the building of my ramp and so, so much more, “love was in the air.”

The group arrived at my house around 8:30am, walked up the steps introducing themselves to me and Ramsey, my Golden Retriever puppy with hugs, hello’s and much Christian love.  Steve cranked up the generator and the cutting of the wood began.  At the same time, other group members took turns tearing down my old wood rails and cheered with each piece they got off.  I was so taken aback that I had to look out the window to see what all of the cheering was about and I realized they were as excited as I was to be getting a safe way in and out of my house.

As the 17-year-old son of one of the ladies cut the wood, each member had their particular job to do.  Some put the wood in place, one held the nail gun, others decided to spend time with me and talk to me as others worked.  I told them my house was their house and they could just come in at any time to cool off, rest, talk, whatever, they made themselves at home. 

Pictures were taken, weeds were pulled up, flower bulbs were planted and mulch was delivered to clean up the front part of the yard.  My ceramic bunnies and squirrel were strategically placed in the mulch and my garden of love was born and it is so cute!

They brought lunch and while sitting on the part of the ramp that was already finished, we talked, fellowshipped, ate and exchanged stories just like Jesus did with the disciples.   Steve finally had to make everyone go back to work.   They even walked Ramsey and replaced a blown fuse in the house.

Teresa Chelko, the leader in the group spent time talking with me out m rare eye disease.  We cried together as we shared stories about our lives.  These folks are my sisters and brothers in Christ!

Around 2:30pm, Steve asked me to come out the front door and try the new ramp.  As I walked with my stroller, Ramsey, tears were in my eyes, and they were all cheering...WOW!  The only word I could cry out was Hallelujah!  I felt so safe and so thankful and now at peace.

We hugged, we cried, I said my “thank you” through the tears as they gave me a planter of flowers to place at the end of the ramp.   God also allowed me to give back what I could…I made thank you cards for everyone; I gave ice and water when they needed a drink.

As they boarded their van to leave, I felt a sense of loss because I don’t get a lot of visitors or calls.  I went over to the young man, who cut all of the wood and I said these words to him, “Thank you, dear. Not many young men your age would spend their holiday weekend doing this for someone.  God has a special blessing on you and much more in store…thank you from the bottom of my heart”.  My...My...What A Blessing!!!

Our next Urban Plunge takes place October 20-23, 2011. Be on the lookout for your chance to GO.