Yesterday was a relaxing afternoon of making some Valentine's crafts. My friends and I are obsessed with Pinterest (what girl isn't?), so most of our inspiration came from that site. My basement became filled with lots of people and lots of paper hearts.
On Saturday I went with some friends to help with a homeless ministry in Chicago. Basically a group of people, mostly college students get together every Saturday evening to walk the streets of downtown Chicago. They bring sandwiches to people living on the streets. Once we arrived we split into small groups. Micah, Kelsey, and I walked along State Street. There was another group passing out food in a nearby location, so we didn't meet that many people, although we did find a few. Micah had the idea of bringing hot chocolate along to offer to people since it was so cold. So there we were...three people and three thermoses full of hot chocolate. We got a lot of stares from other shoppers who were wondering just why we were walking along with thermoses (that were very 70's looking by the way). The first guy we met seemed like he was okay with talking to us at first. After we introduced ourselves he asked us about our jobs and lives. We gave him hot chocolate and then Micah asked if he'd like us to pray with him. Now I must say we were never very pushy about praying with people. The idea was to be kind and get to know these people week after week to eventually build up a relationship with them. Micah has already done this with several people. Unfortunately the man was really not happy when Micah started asking about prayer. He kept saying, "I pray with my life." And he got really angry even though none of us was arguing about anything. Then he told us it was the worst hot chocolate he'd ever tasted and threw it all over the sidewalk. I wasn't offended by this. After all, I'm sure this man has been through a lot, and I'd probably be very bitter about living on the streets. But I feel sad that we probably made his day worse.
Our other encounters with people were much more positive. People were pretty friendly and happy to speak with us. One man smiled a lot and was extremely positive. He was a great encouragement to me and reminded me about having a positive attitude no matter what we're going through. He said that it wasn't really that cold out compared to what it could be.
I, on the other hand, thought it was extremely cold. My hands started getting cold in the first 30 minutes of walking. I wasn't that worried until they started going numb a while later and then I started experiencing stabbing pain in my hands. I have really poor circulation, and even wearing gloves was not helping. At that point I pretty much couldn't think anymore because I was so focused on my hands and how much pain they were in. It was nearly time to meet back up with the whole group for a Bible study, and so I just kept walking straight to the meeting point (which was inside), ignoring everything else around me. All I could think about was getting inside. Here I was, unable to make it 2 hours in the cold, and yet these people we met were sleeping on the streets overnight. I know that I would never be able to make it, and therefore I am humbled at how difficult life must be for them.
The Bible study consisted of all the volunteers plus about 5-7 homeless men. The message was about building a caring community and support system amongst each other. I won't disclose the location where we met, but it was in a public place, and I'm quite impressed that no one minds all those people meeting there with thermoses and left over sandwiches and bags of clothes, etc. It truly is a blessing to all get to come together in a warm place.
Let us be thankful tonight if we have warm houses to sleep in. God is good my friends.
Here are the crafting pics:
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