Brown Bags And Jesus

    As the Christmas Season nears, and our Christmas Eve Service for the homeless on the streets of New Orleans gets closer, I am more and more amazed at how many churches and individuals are contacting us and offering help and support and volunteering their efforts. Families from as far as 3 hours away are driving to spend Christmas Eve to serve the less fortunate for 4 hours or less. These people are collecting gloves, scarves, hats, coats, blankets and other items to help provide for the homeless. As touching as all this is, nothing could have prepared me for what I was going to see today as we were passing out lunches. Last week I put flyers in each bag to let them know that we were going to have an outdoor service and provide them with some of these essentials, when we got there today, I was floored to see the area we plan on having the service. It is a vacant lot with a brick wall on three sides, it had been covered in graffiti for months, and I had planned on going a few days in advance and covering it the best I could, so to hide the vulgarity that was there for everyone to see. As we started feeding today, I was looking around the area to see what I was going to have to plan for and to my surprise, every wall had been covered in white paint.....No graffiti anywhere. When I asked about it, numerous people (homeless people) started offering to clean up the trash before we had the service if we would provide them with the garbage bags they needed. I guess you could take that many different ways, but I took it to mean that these people are starting to have some kind of hope....they want better for themselves, and they respect what God is doing for them! 

Romans 15:13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Where ever you are this Christmas, may the God of Hope be with you!Merry Christmas,Justin and Lisa