Doesn’t everyone need help at some point in their life? It shouldn’t be that hard to find the help you need, right? If your car breaks down, you may need a tow truck, and a mechanic. You call them, they answer and wala you have help. Easy peasey, right? Hmmmm what if your need is a bit harder, with the car example we pay for help, so we get it. What if we can’t pay….? No help……
What if that need is more basic? Love, care, kindness, perhaps.
How do we find that? Is there a phone number? What’s the cost? Can we ask for it if we have no money?
What if you have never experienced any of those things? Isn’t that what our parents do? Love us, care for us, show us kindness? What if they didn’t? If the parent, who’s job it is to do those things can’t love, can’t care, can’t be kind, how then do these kids trust a stranger to care, to love, to be kind. Their own parents did not find them worthy enough, why would a stranger?
Why would they trust us not to hurt them as they have been hurt before?
The bravest, yet hardest thing to do for some of these kids is to believe they are worthy of help, of love, of care, of kindness.
Our job is to show them they are more than worthy!

It’s hard isn’t it? To simply love others as we should. What about their faults? Their differences? Seriously can we love someone who has different beliefs than us? Oh man, and seriously what if they sin differently? Maybe their sin is different than ours, bigger and badder. What if this other person is not Christian? Do they deserve our Love?  Do they deserve to have their own beliefs? Non Christian beliefs? Non Biblical beliefs? If they choose their own beliefs, can we still love them as we are asked to do based on our own beliefs?

I have been a Christian for many years. I am a Christian, I believe in Christ, I believe in the bible, I believe there is sin, and I sin, daily. I try my very best, and I screw it up, daily. Yet when I screw up, when I fall, when I fail, when I sin, the only person I do not worry about unjustly judging me is God. Sad isn’t it, the people who judge our failures, our sins the worst are our fellow Christians. I do it myself, I fail as a Christian daily. I am getting better though, I know God loves me, unconditionally! If I walked away from God, and the bible, would he still love me? If I choose to live a non Christian life would he still love me? I believe He would! He gives us free will. Jesus did not demand everyone follow him, he did not make it illegal for people not to live as he dictated or as he lived. Why then do we feel we have the right to demand people live by our beliefs, make it illegal to not live by our beliefs? Somewhere along the line we forgot what Christ stood for, LOVE!

Matthew 22:36-40

36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?”

37 Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself. 40 All the law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

So I ask: Do we only Love the “Good” neighbors?

I was just sitting here whining to myself about how cold I was, and because I’m cold (because it’s below zero outside) I don’t want to have to spend the time out of my blanket cooking something to eat.  So I was sitting feeling quite irritated that the house is so cold, that the furnace is old and not working well these days, and that heaven forbid I would have to be cold for a little bit to cook something to eat.  Yes I really was sitting here feeling sorry for myself, really wishing someone would bring me some hot food and a heater.  Then reality hit, and hit hard, how spoiled am I sitting here on my couch, in my house, with a blanket and a fridge not far from me with food in it.  I again forget on a daily basis how much I have compared to many out there.  How many people and kids are out there right now without heat, a roof over their head, a blanket, or maybe something warm to eat. I am so very grateful for everything I have been blessed with (even my old furnace) and need to remember more often how blessed I truly am and how it is my/our jobs to reach out to others out there who are not so fortunate .

Oh why, oh why, oh why can’t they make good choices all the time?  We set up guidelines to help them succeed and then have to sit back and watch them make other choices.  We have to watch them fall, and struggle, and yes Fail.  All the while thinking. hoping, praying, and wanting more for them.  If only these kids/teens/young adults could be more like us; the adults of the world.  We have it so together, we are responsible, respectful, and have all the answers…….right???? Dang…..maybe not, well at least I don’t, do you?  This world we live in these days is HARD, more than HARD, it’s near impossible.  I have days every week that I just want to give in, give up and stop caring about the world around me.  Take the easy way, it’s called that for a reason ya know…..it’s easier.  Then I remember why I struggle, why I get up when I fall  and fail, (again and again).  You see there is this guy who never gave up on me EVER.  When I fall he patiently waits for me to get up, when I fail he loves me more so I’ll try again, when I struggle he’s my biggest fan.  He is a Father to all and loves all equally…….imagine that he loves me as much as he loves his own Son, how? I’m nothing like HIS SON,  seriously nothing, yet even if I question everything else in life that’s the one thing I never have to question; His Love.

If He can love someone like me, be patient with someone like me, and never give up on someone like me, then yes I know I can do the same with these teens he entrusts us with.  I can do the hard stuff, and so can they……….

Jan 4th 2013  Had someone ask today “People in America have so much more than anyone else in the world, why wouldn’t you spend you time and money helping someone who needs it more?” This is my answer, have you looked around, or met anyone who is homeless in America, there are so many in our own backyards, with NOTHING! Much the same as in other countries, but still with Nothing, and so many teens out there that are homeless through no fault of their own! So I help where my heart leads me, and that is here, in America, in my own town and in the towns surrounding, in a country that is very Rich, but yet with so many of it’s own in dire need of the basics in life.

Dec. 23rd 2012 “It’s the isolated, defeated kids, the kids in cities and towns without youth shelters, who make me worry – they don’t have any where to make a home or find a community of support. They’re the ones who are most vulnerable to the dangers of the street.” from “Almost Home” a book about Homeless teens a great friend brought me for Christmas. These kids are all around us, we need to give them a place to go, we need your help to do it……….