Living in a predominantly low income community offers up many odd and sometimes tragic images.
Here is a list of some of those moments that made me pause as I move through life down here...
Dog shit upstairs on the floor of a now vacant home.
A house that had many kids living there, in fact right next to that room that smelled and looked like a kennel.
No glass in the livingroom windows. Shot out by a pistol about a week ago.
You can hear conversation from the sidewalk...it's below freezing here.
Scabs in the hairline of a despairing mother....meth death erupting from within.
Red utility notices hanging from door knobs...signaling to everyone you dont have enough money to cover the basics of life...like heat.
Dirty diapers, vomit on the wall, piss soaked floors...living in garbage.
How one lives, no longer matters...when poverty gets a hold of a mind and heart.
Sirens, condoms, whiskey bottles, beer cans, cigarette butts, leaking toilets, exposed wires, smoke detectors without batteries.
It's obvious that nobody can get out of here...they only have one shoe; and who can escape poverty with one shoe?
1 comment:
This post reminded me of something I read the other day. I came across this passage in Galatians 2, Paul went to Jerusalem and met with the pillars of the church. They recognized that Paul was sent by God to go to the gentiles and they gave him the right hand of fellowship and sent him to go to the gentiles and preach. In so doing they asked him to remember one thing. When the verse said they were giving him one piece of advice I took note; what would be the one thing that they would tell him?
That one thing was – “remember the poor”. That wasn’t what I was expecting;
I knew that Paul was eager to do that very thing, but none the less, they chose to remind him of it. It emphasized to me that this is something we all need. It is so very easy to become preoccupied with so many things, and somehow, the things that are at the heart of Christianity are so easily forgotten. So from the mouths of the pillars of the church comes this admonition, “remember the poor”.
Jesus said it many times and in many ways -- “Be merciful as your father is merciful”.
Dad
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