It had been an exhausting day. The last thing I wanted to do at 9PM was to go out to a loud pub and try to strike up conversations with some strangers.
My parents and my teammate’s parents looked at me for direction. I asked how they felt about skipping the pub scene all together and doing homeless ministry again like we had the first night. They were more than okay with going out again. We bought a few meals and headed out through the streets, hitting all of the places that we usually see our homeless friends.
We walked, and walked, and walked more.
No one is on the streets.
No one.
We stood on the sidewalk with bags of food getting cold in our hands trying to figure out what to do. My teammates’ mom led us in prayer and then we started running through other popular hangouts we’d discovered in the city for the homeless. God interrupted the thoughts running through my head that were ranging from “Where do you find homeless people on a night so cold?” and “I’m failing at life right now” with simple instructions.
There’s a girl at Trinity.
That’s all I needed to know exactly where we needed to head. As we walked around the corner I pointed to a columned building and told the parents that was where I needed to be tonight. My mom affirmed this leading and off we went.
I nervously approached a girl leaning against the wall, not really knowing what to do next. I had been so confident in this being where the Lord was leading, and here sat the girl He told me about, wrapped up in her sleeping bag…but I had no idea what to say. I chose to be as eloquent as I could:
Um, hi. Are you hungry?
The girl avoided eye contact, but put her coffee cup of change aside and nodded shyly. I started to hand her dinner and coffee, and she tried to hand part of it back, thinking it couldn’t have all been for her. I assured her that she could enjoy all of it and asked her if I could sit down. I settled in beside her and we sat silent for a while, other than introductions. It was awkward, but I knew she needed more than a warm dinner. We sat in an awkward silence, still without eye contact and slowly she began telling me some of her story.
My heart broke to find out Geralyn was only 18 years old. She had come over from England not too long ago. She had left her home with the promise of a job in Ireland – she was ready and excited for the adventure of a new country and life on her own. Upon arriving though, she found out that this “job” was actually not the job she had been promised. She had two choices – stay with the people who had “hired” her or run.
This is the point where she finally looked me in the eyes and I saw the hurt and confusion in them, the young girl aching for home:
“Sometimes people try to tell me that I have a choice, that I don’t have to be on the streets like this…what they don’t understand is that both of my choices were atrocious. Being homeless on the run is hardly a choice. My hand was forced by the liars who got me to come here in the first place.”
Her story mirrored the many I’ve heard of trafficking victims and my heart shattered to think of this precious and vulnerable 18 year old – homeless and on the run from the chains of trafficking.
We sat and talked for a while longer about her family’s refusal to help her get home and emotions welled up in each of us. For the first time since I sat down with Geralyn, the years and hardness that the past year on the streets had added to her eyes disappeared.
As she spoke with tears rolling down her cheek, I thought of my precious sister Abby, her heart so passionate to fight for girls just like Geralyn and I realize that Geralyn could be Abby. In that moment- Geralyn was no longer some homeless girl I sat down beside in Dublin. No longer was she someone just begging for money.
Geralyn was a friend, no, a sister, desperate for some hope to hold on to. She wasn’t “just another bum” peddling for some change.
She was real. The tears finding their way down our cheeks were real. The loneliness and the fear she expressed – it was all real. She wasn’t my homeless friend anymore – she was just my friend.
We talked like we’d met years ago as she let me in to a bit of her story and I shared a bit of mine. We stopped caring that people were watching and let ourselves truly feel the emotions of what we were sharing.
Geralyn reached out of her sleeping bag and grabbed my hand – I need you to pray for me.
So we sat, in the middle of the sidewalk in Dublin, holding hands with tears rolling down our faces…and we prayed.
And then for the first time, Geralyn let a smile begin to creep across her face. She stopped it shy of taking over her face, squeezed my hand and nodded. I smiled back, squeezed her hand and told her she was loved before I left.
The next day as I was walking through Dublin, I saw her talking to another guy on the street. She looked across the street quickly and we caught each other’s eye…and I had to slow down as I realized what was happening.
Geralyn was smiling.
She nodded as usual and walked off.
And in that moment, my heart swelled with hope (and eyes with tears) that, although there’s a long road to walk, Geralyn is on her way to finding her way home…maybe not to England, but to her home in the loving embrace of Jesus.
