Step Into The Mess

 

Good morning, and welcome to another Thursday Thought.

 Ginger Sprouse is a typical suburban woman living with her husband in an upscale neighborhood in the Houston area.  Some years ago, Steve Hartman with CBS News interviewed Ginger and her husband for one of his “On The Road” segments that airs each Friday at the end of the evening newscast.  The reason for the interview?

Well, it seems that Ginger had always had thoughts of the homeless that she saw regularly that were not kind at all, but rather were condescending and critical.  In the interview, she told Steve Hartman that she often would say demeaning things to them.

  “I would say, ‘Why don’t you get a job?  Or, what’s your problem?’  It made me very uncomfortable.  I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. I’ve been that way my whole life.”

 Ginger had the same attitude toward the homeless as most of us.  We look on the homeless as somehow less than fully human, less than honorable, less than worthy of the dignity and respect every human is due.

How many of us have said the same thing as Ginger, if not directly to a homeless person, at least we thought that line…”Why don’t you get a job?  What’s your problem?”  It’s so easy for those of us who have managed to stay in the middle class to be critical and condescending toward those who are in poverty or are homeless.  We like to think that we’ve made life good for ourselves, and that anyone else could do the same if they’d only put themselves to the task and work their way out of poverty and off of the street.  We believe that their issue is laziness or a lack of desire to succeed.  We point to all of the social services that are available, which our tax dollars pay for, and wonder why they don’t take advantage of them.  We notice their missing teeth, their unkempt appearance and musty body odor and move away from them as much as we can.

 So, why did Hartman interview Ginger Sprouse?  Because she had a change of heart.  She repented of her superior attitude and decided she wanted to do better.  Acting on the decision she made, she befriended a man she had regularly seen on a street corner, first stopping just to talk.  She asked him to tell his story.  His mother, he says, abandoned him when he was yet a child, and he had been in and out of homelessness since that time.  Ginger couldn’t get him out of her mind, and began making regular trips to stop and just visit with him.

 One late fall day when she visited him, she said she decided she couldn’t just leave him there on the street in the cold.  She went home, talked with her husband, and invited Victor Hubbard into their home.  And that was the beginning of a new life for Victor.  They helped him get the social services he needed, medical appointments, and all the rest.  Victor now is working two jobs and is a lifelong member of the family.

Ginger’s life and outlook on life and on people changed as well.  In the closing segment of the news piece with Hartman, Ginger says this about her experience.  “Life is messy.  But if you’re going to love other people, you have to be willing to step into their mess.  My whole life I’ve wanted to avoid that, and that’s why I rolled the window up and didn’t look.”

 “If you’re going to love other people, you have to be willing to step into their mess.”  Ginger Sprouse knows what it’s like to step into someone’s mess.  Ginger Sprouse knows what it’s like to get out of her comfort zone.  Ginger Sprouse knows what it’s like to love other people.

We have known for centuries that the God who created us expects us to love others.  The Torah is explicit in the book of Leviticus. 

 You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.

 At least seven more times in the New Testament, Jesus, Paul the Apostle, and James repeat this command to love others.  And Jesus expanded what it meant to love one’s neighbor by telling the story of the Good Samaritan, who saw to the needs of a man he didn’t know and whose nationality should have been reason enough to ignore his plight.  Nevertheless, he cared for the man as best he could and saw to his needs.  The Samaritan stepped into someone’s mess.

 Are you willing to step into someone’s mess?  Are you willing to have a change of heart?  Are you willing to truly love your neighbor?  You don’t have to take in a homeless person in order to love your neighbor unless you know that is your calling.  There are hundreds of ways you can demonstrate and emulate the love of Jesus.  Your neighbor is hurting.  You can help by stepping into his mess.

 Blessings.