There was no guest room available for them.
Advent Blog; Day 14
I wanted to find some new angles to come at this Christmas blog from. Tonight was our house groups Christmas party and so I thought I would take the opportunity to ask for input. The first person I asked said, without skipping a beat "homelessness". I knew why before he said, because he is a caring individual with a social conscience and, as an ex alcoholic he had paid his dues to that lifestyle. He thinks of Christmas and he automatically thinks of the have nots. Christmas, in keeping with the poetry of the incarnation, is full of contrasts. The present very often serves to remind us of the absent, the dead and the departed. The excessive materialism (that most of us can seldom afford) throws into contrast the poor and neglected. The warmth in many of our homes, in the west, contrasts with the biting cold outside and our thoughts often stray to those less fortunate. And these things have been on my mind so, Neil, this one is for you.
I spent a decent chunk of last night in a freezing caravan, chatting to my vulnerably housed friend. with little money and the sub-zero temperatures outside, he spends his evenings bored out of his brains, standing up, with one gas ring on his cooker, switched on for warmth. Of course the warm air circulates only in the top two inches of the caravan, the difference it makes to the rest of the place is indiscernible. It was so cold that the other day he joked about a chili he had cooked and said, "I didn't know whether to eat it or get in it!"
His plight is one that is special to me as for 18 months I took him into my home. He was made homeless a few years back when the arrangements in a house share began to go pear shaped and he was left holding the can. After quite a while living rough he came to live, at first in a tent, then later a caravan, at the community where I first found myself when my house share arrangements went pear shaped (see my Josephs dilemma blog of 2 days ago). When I left that place for my own house, I took him with me. Things, for various reasons, did not work out and In May he moved back into the caravan, as a temporary solution, for the summer.
My friend, I know, would be the first to admit that he has issues. But none of these issues individually would have got him to the position he finds himself today. It is usually a cocktail of circumstances that brings some-one into this position. I have to say, there but for the grace of God, go I.
As I spoke to Neil about this subject, initially, this evening I asked him what he thought was the one main reason that he had found himself in this way of life, taking it as a given that alcoholism is a symptom more than the disease. The conclusion we came to was love, or a lack of it. There had been a spirit of rejection behind many of his choices. I think this is true of my vulnerably housed friend too.
When I think of Mary and Joseph, looking for shelter and being turned away it reminds me of this nomadic lifestyle that Jesus was to have for much of his life. He was born on the run, he moved to Egypt, he returned to Nazareth, Galilee, and as an adult he wandered as he taught from town to town. I can't say I will ever know the answer to this question but I wonder if having a sense of restlessness wasn't part of the whole deal. Later, as an adult He says
But Jesus replied, "Foxes have dens to live in, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place even to lay his head."~Luke 9:58
Jesus seems to make integral to his teaching kindness to strangers, welcoming the alien, feeding the hungry, sheltering the needy. I think the theme of homelessness, not to trivialise or do a disservice to the issue, is one of the great themes of the Bible. For the majority of the old testament the people of God were exiles wandering. The theme of pilgrimage runs throughout too. The spiritual life is not a settling life, it is a journey to find our true home, in God. King David too gets a sense of this longing for a home as he writes in Psalm 84 Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young, he uses this to highlight his own longing for belonging and, though he has a palace, a true home.
How lovely is your dwelling place,
Lord Almighty!
My soul yearns, even faints,
for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out
for the living God(from psalm 84)
As Neil and I discussed, love is the thing that stops many of us becoming physically homeless. Love is our true home; to be loved and to love in return. In this world our circumstances will fluctuate but love will never abandon us, will cause us to value ourselves as we are valued. This Love is ultimately our hearts final resting place, the journey of the soul complete. In the words of the old spiritual, that I first learnt through a Larry Norman song "This world is not my home, I'm just passing through!"
So lets remember at Christmas what Jesus taught and practised in kindnesses to strangers, as, in a sense he came to give us a home. Out of our plenty can we think about how much we really have, step up to the plate and buy a homeless person a cup of tea, give money to "shelter" or The Salvation Army, sign up to help in a food bank or soup kitchen, befriend those we come across and treat them with dignity and respect, encourage others to do the same. The son of God and his whole family were once in this position too.
No comments:
Post a Comment