Available…for His glory.

What a God day…

We started off with breakfast at IHOP near the neighborhood we will be doing construction.  We tried to find our house but couldn’t so we took a field trip up one of the earthen levees by

Lake

Ponchatrain

.  We then drove down to the lower Ninth Ward.  There was a lot of groundbreaking going on, CNN was down there and about 7 tour buses.

Today was to be servant evangelism and prayerwalking day.  We knew we had a lot of sodas to give out and decided to do that in

Jackson Square

to the folks who have tables and street perform set up.  We decided to make goodie bags for the police precinct down in the French Quarter.  We also wanted to do something for the homeless population under the bridge that the boys asked about last night.  So we headed to Sam’s.  After we went to Sam’s we headed to Dollar Tree to pick up some items that we couldn’t get at Sam’s.  While in the Dollar Tree we decided that we should pick up some Easter buckets in case there were any homeless children.  So we headed to Walmart.

After WalMart we swung by, picked up a big ol bucket of Chicken Fingers and headed back to the Seminary to eat and make our bags.  Little did we realize what was coming….

We went to the police station to drop off our police goodie bags and ask them about the people under the bridge.  They told us not to go there ourselves but got us in contact with Sam- The Homeless Assistance Collabrative Officer.  He told us that he would be down by a wall on the other side of the French Quarter at 6:45 and would be feeding a group of people and we could come bring our hygiene bags then. 

So in the mean time we headed off with our rolling cooler full of sodas and water.  Straight away we ran into a homeless man that we met last night by the river.  He was asking us for 2 quarters- same as last night.  We gave him a soda and a dollar.  We continued handing out sodas to sidewalk performers, homeless people and some “psychics”  plus anyone else we thought needed a smile.  Oh and some gummie smiley packages from WalMart.

I loved to see people’s faces as they realized we were not selling drinks.  One man chased us down (he was an artist) and tried to give me $5.  He said “I just want to thank your church for what you are doing.”  I told him that he could keep his money.  I explained that we try to do stuff like this and NEVER take anyone’s money- even if they say they are donating it to our church.  I told him “give it to your church.”  He said “You are my church.”  I wanted to hug him- but he was really tall and he already started jetting back to his booth around the corner.  I wish I had gone back.

We made our round and went up to the river walk area to finish the drinks we had and head to the van.  We had 5 cokes left. 

Dalton

woke up a man (he didn’t realize he was asleep) and gave him a coke.  While the guys were talking to this man another man came up to Bruce and said something. Bruce asked if he wanted a coke- the man asked for Bruce to pray for him.  So they held hands over a coke and prayed.  It was great to see our guys huddled up around these 2 men just being Jesus- sharing, listening and being available to be a friend for a little bit.

We walked around a little bit and headed to the wall were dinner was to be served.  Turns out that churches have been taking turns for 12 years feeding the homeless community outside in a random dirt parking lot.  At 6:45 all these cars started driving up and 2 small trailers.  Out come the tables, the food, drinks, and a place where fresh clean socks were given out.  They said that they used to wash feet but the man with the equipment currently works on Sundays.  So they try to clean them up as requested and there is a nurse to help with any woundcare. 

The group set up a table for us to hand out our bags.  I cannot explain the comments we got from the men and women who went by and picked up bags from us.  We saw people sharing what little they had with their friends and not keeping extras for themselves.  We saw folks helping one another just because they needed help.  We saw Sam the Policeman call people by their name.  I don’t know Sam’s story but I see that he loves these people.  We saw Jesus in Sam. 

As we were handing out bags, I realized there were some children coming to the table so I asked someone to get the Easter buckets out of the van.  We gave 6 buckets away to the 6 kids 11 years old and younger.  It was enough to make you want to load the family up in our van and bring them back with us.  I wish we could have put them in a Jacuzzi tub and let them make a big bubbly mess with water all over the floor until they were all pruny and the water got cold- then warm their water up so they could sit and play as long as they wanted. 

I say all of this so hopefully you can see how much God was in our day.  One thing lead to another.  Because we decided to make the police bags, because we asked them about the homeless people we ended up in an amazingly great picture of God’s family serving.  Because we decided at the last minute to make Easter buckets we had something extra for those kids.  Because all of this happened hopefully Jesus was seen today.

Not ONCE did we say “This is from Cornerstone.”  I don’t even know that the church serving by the wall asked what church that we were from.  We were just brothers and sisters in Christ serving.  We could NEVER have arranged anything as amazing as how things happened today.  WE have seen Jesus.  We wish we could do it again tomorrow night.  I feel like something new may come up.  You never know with God’s plans.  And we do still have a cooler full of cokes…

When I get a better connection I will upload pics.  Hopefully by tomorrow