This was a pretty big week for me. I’ve been in a pretty intense accelerated degree program here at Bellevue University and Saturday, I gave my final presentation and turned in my final paper. I’m done. What a great feeling. Because, you see, we moved back to Omaha in July of 2006. In August of that year, I was enrolled in school and it’s been pretty intense ever since. So to be coming up on the end is a pretty good feeling. I also came back here in a contract for hire position at Union Pacific Railroad. I got word last week that I’ve cleared all the hurdles necessary to become a full time employee. December 1, barring any thing really weird happening, I’ll leave the consulting industry and become a regular old working stiff. I’ve been in consulting for over 10 years. It’s taken us from Omaha to Florida to Charlotte, N.C. and now back to Omaha. While it’s been a great ride, I’m ready for a little stability and a little normalcy, whatever that may look like. So all that happened within the past week. And I topped it all off by going on a date with a beautiful young girl on Saturday night. Pssst. Don’t tell Robin. I met this young lady about 7 years ago. I thought we needed to spend a little time together so she might begin to see how a young man should treat her when she begins dating. When she’s 18! Erin and I went to dinner and a movie. In all the crazy times that we’ve had lately, I just really sat across from her at Red Robin and realized how absolutely, unbelievably blessed I am as a father and husband. I simply could not believe that God would entrust to me a beautiful little creature such as this. We had a ball!
And today? 52 weeks! We celebrated our one year anniversary of hanging out on a crazy corner in downtown Omaha with about 150 or our newest friends. I talked about this last week, but it is simply unbelievable to me that we’ve been able to do this thing for a year now. This was a normal birthday Sunday for us, so we combined that with a little one year celebration. As we got ready to pray today, on a downtown corner with all these ladies and gentlemen and I spoke about how blessed we have been in this past year, I almost wanted to thank them for being homeless. Now stick with me here. I don’t for one minute wish that on anyone. But they are. And because of that, we are now forever linked. I did thank them however, for allowing a bunch of us from the suburbs to come into their world on a weekly basis. What were we thinking a year ago? That we could actually make a difference? Well, we knew that with God as our guide, we could certainly be a light in a dark corner. With the hope of Christ’s salvation, we could offer that to anyone who might be willing to listen. 52 weeks! What an amazing year it’s been. When every single night at my dinner table my kids are praying for our friends downtown. By name! When we first started? They’d pray for the homeless. Now? The pray for their friends. Praise God. They get it. Mostly more than me at times.
So today, we celebrated birthdays. For Cedric. And Eric. And us. Our first birthday. Praise God that He would see fit to let us do this wonderful work in His name. This thing is starting to take on a life of its own now. I suppose that’s how it works. Being new to this sort of ministry work, we (or at least I am) are pretty naïve when it comes to figuring out where we are supposed to take it and how it’s supposed to evolve. But in the end, we don’t have to worry about that. It’ll happen because He wants it to happen. Or not. He seems to want it to happen. I talked to a fellow today, Dan, who said he comes to the park once a week. He’s not homeless. He was once I believe. Not now. He comes because it offers him an opportunity for fellowship. He always hugs me and tells me he loves me. And I can tell he means it. And I love him. Heck, I love ‘em all! But I always try to deflect that to a point. As I told all these guys today before we prayed, without an amazing Father, none of this is possible. Without the things we learned at University City Fellowship in Concord, North Carolina, we’d probably be holed up in a church somewhere doing other stuff. But God had a different plan for us. For now, this is our gig. Bringing the love of Christ in a warm meal, some warm clothing and lots of great fellowship. I simply cannot describe what it feels like to pray with all these guys on a weekly basis. It may seem simple. It may seem naïve. But one year ago this was not happening on that corner. It was isolated, barren and somewhat desolate at noon on Sundays. A local church would come by and drop off sack lunches. Literally drop them off at the curb and leave. No fellowship. No conversation. Is that all they deserved? Can’t we do better than that? So as we prayed today, I was in awe at the fact that we are now praying. Together. It’s been a slow process. I’m certainly no preacher. I just don’t think it’s my gift. Now I can talk! Don’t’ get me wrong there. I can certainly do some talking. But preaching? I don’t know. I do know that God will give me the words to say when I need them. He always does. Every time. And today we had guys asking about Tuesday. Our weekly bible study/missional community at The Vine. The relationships are such that we don’t have to necessarily ask people to go. They seem to want to go. We stop by the shelter on our way and pick up a few of the guys that want to go. Guys I didn’t know a year ago. What a year!
So over the course of the last 15 months or so, as I’ve meandered through my degree program, writing 5-10 page papers every week, reading things I would probably never have picked up on my own, I’ve been able to present our ministry in different classes on 3 different occasions. How cool is that? I was in a leadership program. Gave 2 different presentations over the course of a year in that class related to our downtown activities. I just finished a 3 month civic program. Guess what my civic project centered on? Yep. God’s ministry that we just happen to be a part of. So yesterday, I gave my final presentation. Got 100 points on the presentation. And it was easy. Because I love what we do. I love God’s mission in our life. My family is involved in a weekly piece of God’s work that I can’t wait to get to each and every week. I use the word amazing a lot. I can’t help it. It is amazing to me to be able to stand in front of people and tell them about this ministry. So yesterday, after my presentation and along with the great feeling of completion in this program, I get my grade. 100%. For talking about God’s work. I almost felt like I cheated. Ya know what I mean? I mean this was easy to put together. I had pictures of our friends. I had stories. It really was easy. I love the work that he has placed in our laps. He is amazing. And just to show us that He really is the most awesome and amazing Being in the universe? As if he has to? My professor hands me a donation check for $100.00 for our mission. For Gods’ work. I got to stand there and talk about it and then get a great grade and a check to boot. You’ve got to be kidding me. I was speechless.
And butter? Well some guy shows up today and has the following very brief conversation with Robin. We were pretty much wrapping up. He looks at her and says ( and I have to paraphrase…) as he looks over at the serving table where food was laid out just minutes earlier…“you know, that bread…well you know that the Bible says about God being the butter?” Huh? God is the butter? “Well, that bread would be good with some butter”, he says. “Because the Bible says, God is the butter”. I have no idea what that means, but I’ll tell you I laughed all the way home as she told me that story. Me, her, the kids…we laughed so hard all the way home. I’m laughing now as I type this. God is the butter? I don’t know…I just don’t know.
What a week. What a year. We are so blessed. God is so good. I so love Him and all He’s placed before us. What an amazing ministry. And He is the butter! Who would have known...imagine that!
Peace and have a great and blessed week.
..."it matters to that one"... :)
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