This past Monday night, As I pulled up around the curb, I spotted a crowd of people: homeless, abandoned, and lost. If you've never been to an outreach, at first glance, they seem like they chose a life of poverty and addiction, a life that this world looks down upon. Don’t get me wrong, our lives develop with the choices we make…
But Take a second look.
I see a woman who suffers from mental illness. This woman has surrendered to a life of homelessness. She gives everything she has for a man (who also lives on the street). She will ask for money and turn it over to him. She asks for men’s shoes pretending it’s for her, but it’s really for him. She does it all to give it to him, while he leads her on to get what he pleases, with no real interest or love for her. She sits on the dirty street barefoot and disheveled. I see a broken woman. Her purity and self-esteem is shattered. She has been robbed.
The first part of John 10:10 states “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy;”
You see, WE (humans) are God’s beautiful creation. In Genesis it describes that when God created mankind, he said that it was GOOD. He was pleased and he saw how beautiful all that he had made was.
Satan hates that. He hates that we are beautiful to God. He hates that we have purpose and hope, while he has been sentenced for the ultimate defeat. He hates that Jesus came and conquered death.
But I’ll tell you what he does enjoy: He sure enjoys the fact that he has people on the streets held captive. He absolutely loves to confuse us into believing the lie that we are not worthy. He is constantly trying to get in our heads to convince us that our lives will always be hopeless. He shoves darkness into the lives of the lost and without Jesus, people are defenseless against him.
But I have great news.
The Second part of that verse says “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” Jesus came so that we didn’t have to live this way. I think of Jesus and when he walked the streets of Galilee. He saw the despair, the sickness, the sin that had consumed the world. He was there on a mission to let us know that through Him, we can still attain all the goodness that had been prepared for us since Eden. Which brings me back to this Monday night and this ministry.
Some believe that this work goes to waste. “These people will never change” they say. Week after week, Year after year, and I still see a few people that I’ve known since 2008. I admit. It’s not an easy mission. In the words of the Dream Center “It’s one of the toughest, most discouraging mission fields in the world. And it’s right in our backyard.”
But let’s take a quick sec and present this idea unto God.
Each Monday and Wednesday night our team members head out to Downtown Miami for outreach. We take hope and promise of a new life to some of the most broken people living in the darkest of circumstances. We have a mission to seek out the lost as Jesus did. You see, the world may forget you, but Jesus will NEVER abandon you!
I can just hear Him telling me in simple words: "Plant the seed. I am the gardener that will nurture it in its time. "