A Sweet Spot
by Dawn North
On this day, a warm cloudy Sunday morning in April, those who mourn are a mixed bag of people standing in a parking lot of a small church in southwestern Johnson County. Included in this motley group are thirty-somethings in jeans and ball caps with babies on their hips, middle-aged ladies in pretty dresses, old men with long hair and scraggly beards pushing walkers and not-so-old men with too-few teeth and grimy clothes leaning on canes. There are kids with quizzical looks on their faces, teens with watery eyes and people like me who feel a sadness somewhere down deep inside. You see, one of our own has just had a stroke. And died.
And so this crazy mix of people is mourning. Mourning for a guy named Ed. A guy with wispy white hair sticking out from under a ball cap. A guy who pushed a wheelchair to help him get where he needed to go. A guy who rarely missed a Sunday. A guy who lived in a tent.
Ed was one of the thirty or forty homeless men and women who arrive in vans every Sunday morning at Redemption Church in Olathe. They make their “homes” on the outskirts of society. No job, no close family, no car, no money. I started to add to the list, “no hope.” But, thanks to this church, some are regaining hope that had long been gone in their lives.
It is people such as these that a couple of thousand years ago Jesus went out of his way to help and to heal. People on the margins. The quiet voices on the edges that get drowned out by the rest of us. And he charged his followers to take over this job before he left. But we haven’t been very good at it. I’m not sure why. Maybe because it’s messy or inconvenient or uncomfortable or hard.
Even though it is all of those things, Redemption Church has decided it’s worth it. They take Jesus’ command seriously. On any Sunday morning, the poorest of the poor can not only grab a coffee and donut, but also a shower (sprinkled with love) served with a large cup of dignity. Besides that, there is a Bible study just for them before the regular service. And sometimes hot meals or sack lunches to go.
Mother Teresa said, “There is more hunger in the world for love and appreciation than for bread.” It is this that the homeless among us crave. And this, that we at Redemption, try to give them. No judgment. No condemnation. No pressure to change. In this place, grace comes without a price tag. It is free.
In this sweet spot of redemption, lives are changed. There are no trumpets, no mega signs, no television ads announcing to the city what is happening here. It is a quiet transformation. And it is holy. When we gather in this sweet spot, we are safe. We are sheltered, at least for a little while, from the bigger world outside. And we are one. I think Ed knew that.
First published in Johnson County Lifestyle, June 2014.