Voice Calling from the Wilderness

Nashville's a great city, but it has it's wounds.

This week I would return to the overpass to commune with the lonely and displaced: the refugees of fortune's backlash. I listen to my iPod on the way, listening to bands ranging from Take It Back! to Jon Foreman and M. Ward. If there are things that make me more sensitive to the voice of the omniscient or the beckoning of love, they usually pertain to M. Ward or other neo-folk. And then I listen to the song Ara Batur by Sigur Ros. Every time I hear it, my eyes look up to the sky and I swear I can see a rip in the fabric of the cosmos. God comes alive. And I dine with him.

I have an excitement to my step tonight. I'm eager to search the crowd for John the Anarchist (who provided me with the gospel last week), but as I circle the concrete in anticipation, I don't find him. I get a little sad and stand in the back with the friends I come with. I should call them my family. We all live together and eat together and learn together. I guess that's what families do. (And I have a great one back home to show me such a manifestation of love) I find one of the girls who came with me and we both circle the lines of people, shaking hands and asking how they were doing. Some recognized us from last week, but I see a lot of fresh faces. I inquire the Almighty if there's someone who needs prayer. I come to a guy who's name escapes me at the moment (Lord Almighty, I hate it when that happens. I loathe it). We pray for him and his family. He just got a part-time job at Vanderbilt hospital, and he's hoping for it to promote to fulltime. He has a family, though most of them are grown. He has children and grandchildren. And he's on his way up, and he doesn't want to fall. We retreat to the back supports of the over pass where someone stands guard the "Prayer Request Table" (as the cardboard had it labeled). We all look at the service, whose stage lights have now come on. The rich white people of whatever Baptist church begin to sing their songs with their backtracks, and I get a bit unsettled. Rich white people talking to a bunch of addicts, runaways and just plain people with bad luck about how God provides. I get a bit judgemental and start to get ancy to get the night over with. If John isn't here, what reason am I here for?

And then I see him.

This guy is dantily picking up soda cans out of the trash can. I had seen him before when I first got there, but I didn't talk to him. I was nervous and I wanted only to see John, so I just kinda patted his shoulder and said, "Hey man, grace and peace." Now, here he is in front of me, picking up some spare change from the garbage. I feel the push and the girl forementioned follows me again. I say, "Hey, how's it going?" and smile a big smile because I know I'm about to get to smell like the inside of some grandfather's armpit. I unzip my sweatshirt and pull of my sweater. I have a single white t-shirt on, and I start to dig through the salisbury steak and the veggies to get to the off-brand tin that would get this guy at least some moolah. My friend, the girl, comes and joins in and the victim of our help let's out a little "Ooo!" out of shear suprise. After we get enough sauce on our hands, he says thank you about a million times and we move on to the next one. And then the next one after that, and the next one after that; and the one of after that. We end up going through five garbage cans around the sanctuary. We managed to get someone hand-sanitizer from the ladies in the food trailers, but rubbing alcohol ain't gonna rub that stank away. I put my shirts back on and zip up my hoodie, and I smile. I shake his hand firmly and look right at him when he repeats, "Thank y'all! Thank y'all so much! Name's Clint! Thank y'all! Y'all wonderful! God bless ya!"

But admist our own mission, we see Clint starting to go and grab everyone's trash and throw it out for them. He actually goes through the probably one hundred fifty people and cleans it all up for everyone. And then we see other people giving him their cans, and this cycle of people cleaning up and helping each other booms! It was a truly wonderful sight to see.

God is good.

I had also talked to a guy named Mike. He'd been out on the streets for a few weeks, or some short length of time. He'd gotten caught up in drinking and all that goes with it, which isn't anything pleasant. He said he'd been drinking heavily for two years and then it just caught up with him. I pray with him and there were specific words and phrases within the prayers that rang completely true with him. They were factors that he'd actually be struggling with, which made me feel glad that the spirit used me. Selfish, I know, but I was happy to be able to talk with the guy and help him out as much as I can.

I stayed with him the rest of the service, not even talking much, but just sitting with him. He was smiling and young. The guy's not deranged or anything, nor is he old. He's only gotta be about 24...26 at the most. He's tall and pretty fit. Just a bad stroke o' luck, and it sucks. And sometimes, looking at these services, I feel like the barrier is still there. I feel as if the social classes are two levels of Dante's Inferno. Each having it's own torture, but we got there one way or another and we have to deal with it. This, however, can be remedied easily by a shake of hand and exchanging of words. He was glad I was there I would see him the next week.

I saw Clint that next week (which I guess is this week now) as well. I helped him get his cans again, and we were actually told we were distracting attention from the service, so we took our garbage cans behind the cement barrier. Which is funny. I figured church service wouldn't mind us helping out the poor, but I guess it was a bit distracting from the hype booming from the pre-recorded tracks and rich whiteys.

But that's a very judgemental statement and I complied with something they wanted us to do. To make a scene is to be prideful. But pray for Clint. His car payment is due, he's got no money, and someone stole all of his cans (and he had a crap load of cans.) So, lady luck is not so helpful right now.

It's late on a friday night and I'm tired. This is a lousy ending to a great story, but my body is punishing me right now.

May grace and peace reach us all.

Let us bring the kingdom closer.

Love wins.