It was dark, we were in a hurry, the car in front of us swerved around something in the road.. As we approved we seen that it was a little old man with a walker in the middle of the road, we swerved around him and in our rear view mirror we seen other cars doing the same, that he was going to be hit was apparent. With only 2 words said we turned the car around to get that poor decrepit man off the street and out of dangers way.. As we gently pulled him out of the road he rambled about going home, and headed for our new van.. He obviously wanted a ride and we had no clue what he was telling us… We said ” ummm ok well maybe he will show us where he lives?” no such luck.. We had no clue what to with this gentleman and so we drove him to our church..
Once there he got out of the van and sat slowly sat down, the pastor came out and tried to talk to him.. But the booze and the brokenness of his life had taken its toll on him; he had escaped into a reality we could not follow him into, and so with no clue what to do we just sat and listened.. I could tell the pastor was in deep thought, not even hearing his rambling words anymore. I asked “what do we do with him? Is there a place to take him?” The pastor ignored me as he stared at the ground with a deep look of concern and grief in his eyes.. After about 5 more mins i said, “What does our bible say to do with him?” The pastor took a deep sigh and rubbed his beard. Our team just looked at each other and Crystal(a Spanish teacher at the church) said there is no place for him, there are no shelters that will take him in, and there are so many homeless disabled people in Mexico that walk in the middle of the road that everyone just drives around them.. My heart broke.. Chad said, what if I pay my own money and get him a room for the night at that hotel up the road, so he can get rest and a shower for a night? But the pastor turned and said, “ They won’t take him”. So I just sat there beside him, listening to him cry as he tells us his story about his broken life, a wife that is gone and a house that was taken from him.. He likedme it seems.. hehe, so, although I could hardly breath sitting so close to him I felt called to stay there…
Finally the Pastor spoke, he said that we would take him to a rental he has down the road and he could eat and sleep there for the night.. *sigh* I was so relieved! I forgot to mention that this homeless man had been asking over and over to seep in the church, but even “I” understood why we couldn’t let him do that.. So we ushered him into the car and took him to the room.. He was sad we were leaving him and we all wondered if he would stay..
On the way home my heart was heavy for the pastor, I felt as if we placed him in a bad situation and I apologized and told him we had A LOT to learn.. He said “ Do not apologize Tauna, you did what you felt called to do and your right, we need to do what the bible says to do, this reaffirms my thoughts that we need a rescue mission here, so next time we will have a place to put him.”
Well, as I walked up the road to see if he was still in his room this morning I seen that he was gone.. Chad told me that he seen him leave, walking down the road this morning after having a good nights sleep in a warm room and a tummy full of food.. HE took a picture and we all laughed as he showed us and we realized HE WAS WALKING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD AGAIN! *laughs*
