Helping the Homeless Beggars (In United States)
Greetings to my sisters in Christ.
Another day is almost done and I'm thankful for every minute of it. We all need to realize how precious every single second, minute and hour is that the Lord blesses us with.
While we travel we see a lot of homeless and although many are more humble and have less to shed of the world than most people, their hearts don't seem any closer than anyone else. We still stop at every one we can to offer the gospel, food and help to get off the streets....sadly we see most are con artists. How do we know?
Because we sleep in the same parking lots and stand on the same corners as they do! Our life is at the level of the lowly, we see their lives more than the average person.
Tonight I want to encourage you sisters to use caution in helping the homeless beggars.
That picture is funny because it looks like a homeless guy on the corner but it's brother Jim on his phone :-) Because we don't dress like the world and dress biblical (big, baggy, plain clothes) we are thought to be homeless. (We were going for a walk and he stopped to read a text from a brother and I kept walking the lot until he was done. I thought it was funny, he said I could use it here.)
Anyway, what I wanted to share with you is that you need to be careful when it comes to helping the homeless.
1. Your safety. It's a dangerous world out here and we have come across homeless that have evidence of demonic activity. (Irrational speaking of tongues, quivering, strange voices and speech, out of control laughter and some come right out and admit there's something wrong.)
2. Your money. God has given you resources and you need to be very careful how you use them. Randomly giving out money to homeless is a bad idea because we know most use it not for helping themselves get their life right, instead they use it to help themselves to drugs and alcohol.
If you are married or have a spiritual head, you need to be discussing these things with them first.
3. Most are con artists, coming up with carefully crafted stories to reach the person who is coming up to them. They also use age, disabilities, children, women etc.
Let me share some stories with you of what the real case is behind most of the homeless we have come across.
NOTE: Every homeless that we come across get the gospel.
* Not all beggars are homeless.
* We stood out in South Dakota holding gospel signs a couple years ago and watched the opposite corner as a homeless man stood there for an hour. Then a nice car pulled up, several adults and children got out. A woman and child came over, stood on that corner and the man moved to another corner across the parking lot. As people pulled up by the woman and little girl, they handed out bags of food and money. As soon as she got food she sent the girl over to the car with it and everyone could partake of it. This rotation happened most of the afternoon, then they jumped in their nice car and drove off.
* We talked to a homeless woman in Montana that said right out, they don't want off the streets. Many of them get apartment vouchers and some of room up together. She also told us how they can go, every night, to the community center for dinner and showers.
* Brother Jim asks every single one if they want to get off the streets and most of them say they don't want to. They like the freedom.
* We know of a woman that gave a homeless woman a large amount of money and found out that later that afternoon the woman gambled it away.
* We were working online and a homeless man asked for some change to buy some food. Brother Jim said he'd buy him a hamburger and the man said yes. He got it, opened the bun and looked at it, then set it on the window ledge wanting nothing to do with it.
* One night a man asked for $4 to go in and buy some prescription medicine for his diabetes. Brother Jim offered to walk in with him to buy it for him but the guy all of a sudden didn't need it any more.
* We rolled into a town and a man was sitting on a bench on the corner right where we parked. Brother Jim talked to him and he was all nice, said he loves God etc. Brother Jim offered him lunch (he wasn't hungry) the gospel and help to get off the streets. We went inside to work online and about an hour later I came out to get something from the van and the man started yelling at me, asking when we were going to leave because our van was blocking the people from seeing him.
* We got out of our van and were walking into the store when we saw a man limping across the parking lot. He stood by a van until we walked by and then asked if we had any change to help him out. Brother Jim talked to him and was giving him the gospel and said he would bring some food out if he was still there. He took off at a fast walk across the parking lot...no limp.
* We've seen men walking down the sidewalk like normal. We come back around through town and see them limping with a cane with a cardboard sign begging for money.
* I walked into a grocery store and saw a homeless man sitting on the ground outside the door tearing a piece of cardboard and writing on it.
* Brother Jim talked to a man on a corner outside a grocery store and the man didn't need anything except money. Of course we don't give out money and he got the gospel. Later that night his wife called asking for money to get groceries. She said they can't make it to the food pantry because their car broke down. Brother Jim offered to pay for a taxi to get them there and they didn't want it.
* We saw a woman beggar who said she was from Texas, had 2 children who were cold and hungry and her husband was disabled. (Said they were trying to get gas and money to get to Florida.) She said they were sitting over at McDonalds (across the street), hungry and so we went over there. We saw the man with 2 children, piles of food all over the table and the man and children were on internet phones, well dressed and full. We have since seen her standing on many corners around the state.
* Many of the homeless are carrying very large, very heavy backpacks yet say they are disabled.
* We've seen them out begging for food for their animal but it must be either grain free or organic.
* We were walking through a parking lot and saw a sleeping bag alongside the road and when we looked around we saw a man walking quickly over there to get it. We kept walking along the other side of the parking lot and not to much later we saw him stuffing it all into a van.
* We had this one happen today. We were in our van with the door open getting ready to go down the road when a beggar woman came up to the door asking for a cigarette. We said we didn't smoke and before she could get a gospel card she left. As we were leaving the parking lot and saw her on the corner begging so we pulled over, gave her a small food packet that we give to beggars and asked her story. She said her husband just went to jail and she just had a relative die. (We hear that often.) She got the gospel. Brother Jim tested her too, he asked her if the store gets upset about beggars being on their corner and she said 'No, only if there are a lot of them at one time.' (Proves she does this a lot.)
I'm not doing this to cut anyone down, to belittle beggars or not love my neighbor because we do, we try to help each one of them just like we would help someone who wasn't a beggar. I do this because when we watch these beggars for a while we see the vast majority of the people they get their money from are women.
So I appeal to you sisters, be very wise as to how you deal with beggars.
Something to think about...we constantly hear (directly from them) that churches, food pantries and people are always giving them food so they won't starve. There are shelters all over America that provide food, beds, showers and training to get jobs. I recall one time we heard about a park not far from our old homestead in WI that was filled with homeless people in December. (WI is a very cold winter state.) I called the city hall and talked to the woman there to see if this was true, what was being done and what we could do to help but she said they all had found places in their relatives homes. She said she wasn't sure what the town would do with them to get them in homes if their relatives kicked them out. I asked about shelters in the area and she said there are several.....but get this....
THEY DIDN'T WANT TO GO
They didn't want to go an hour and a half away from where they were. None were working, they were eating off the food banks and now off their relatives and because they didn't want to go to some of the vacant shelters who would help them get off the street, get jobs, housing vouchers, clothes etc to get them going again...that town had to deal with them.
Not one time have we met a beggar that wants off the street.
In fact we meet so many men that say they can't work yet they drive cars, lug big back packs around and stand for hours on the corners in the heat and cold. Then on the other hand we see men in wheel chairs working 12 hr shifts, elderly men who are in ther 80's working as a greeter, elderly women pulling an oxygen tank cleaning restrooms, very disabled young men working as stockers etc.
Money won't help them but the gospel will. That's what we share with them, the good news along with a little food bag we have made up for them to show love and an offer to help them in the things of God or to get off the street.
Take it for whatever it's worth and make good decisions on how you deal with beggars.
Have a joyous day sisters.
Have a blessed evening.
Love in Christ,
Sister Deb
Another day is almost done and I'm thankful for every minute of it. We all need to realize how precious every single second, minute and hour is that the Lord blesses us with.
O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.
Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he hath redeemed from the hand of the enemy;
And gathered them out of the lands, from the east, and from the west, from the north, and from the south.
They wandered in the wilderness in a solitary way; they found no city to dwell in.
Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted in them.
Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distresses.
And he led them forth by the right way, that they might go to a city of habitation.
Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
For he satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness.
(Psalm 107:1-9)
Because we sleep in the same parking lots and stand on the same corners as they do! Our life is at the level of the lowly, we see their lives more than the average person.
Tonight I want to encourage you sisters to use caution in helping the homeless beggars.
That picture is funny because it looks like a homeless guy on the corner but it's brother Jim on his phone :-) Because we don't dress like the world and dress biblical (big, baggy, plain clothes) we are thought to be homeless. (We were going for a walk and he stopped to read a text from a brother and I kept walking the lot until he was done. I thought it was funny, he said I could use it here.)
Anyway, what I wanted to share with you is that you need to be careful when it comes to helping the homeless.
1. Your safety. It's a dangerous world out here and we have come across homeless that have evidence of demonic activity. (Irrational speaking of tongues, quivering, strange voices and speech, out of control laughter and some come right out and admit there's something wrong.)
2. Your money. God has given you resources and you need to be very careful how you use them. Randomly giving out money to homeless is a bad idea because we know most use it not for helping themselves get their life right, instead they use it to help themselves to drugs and alcohol.
If you are married or have a spiritual head, you need to be discussing these things with them first.
3. Most are con artists, coming up with carefully crafted stories to reach the person who is coming up to them. They also use age, disabilities, children, women etc.
Let me share some stories with you of what the real case is behind most of the homeless we have come across.
NOTE: Every homeless that we come across get the gospel.
* Not all beggars are homeless.
* We stood out in South Dakota holding gospel signs a couple years ago and watched the opposite corner as a homeless man stood there for an hour. Then a nice car pulled up, several adults and children got out. A woman and child came over, stood on that corner and the man moved to another corner across the parking lot. As people pulled up by the woman and little girl, they handed out bags of food and money. As soon as she got food she sent the girl over to the car with it and everyone could partake of it. This rotation happened most of the afternoon, then they jumped in their nice car and drove off.
* We talked to a homeless woman in Montana that said right out, they don't want off the streets. Many of them get apartment vouchers and some of room up together. She also told us how they can go, every night, to the community center for dinner and showers.
* Brother Jim asks every single one if they want to get off the streets and most of them say they don't want to. They like the freedom.
* We know of a woman that gave a homeless woman a large amount of money and found out that later that afternoon the woman gambled it away.
* We were working online and a homeless man asked for some change to buy some food. Brother Jim said he'd buy him a hamburger and the man said yes. He got it, opened the bun and looked at it, then set it on the window ledge wanting nothing to do with it.
* One night a man asked for $4 to go in and buy some prescription medicine for his diabetes. Brother Jim offered to walk in with him to buy it for him but the guy all of a sudden didn't need it any more.
* We rolled into a town and a man was sitting on a bench on the corner right where we parked. Brother Jim talked to him and he was all nice, said he loves God etc. Brother Jim offered him lunch (he wasn't hungry) the gospel and help to get off the streets. We went inside to work online and about an hour later I came out to get something from the van and the man started yelling at me, asking when we were going to leave because our van was blocking the people from seeing him.
* We got out of our van and were walking into the store when we saw a man limping across the parking lot. He stood by a van until we walked by and then asked if we had any change to help him out. Brother Jim talked to him and was giving him the gospel and said he would bring some food out if he was still there. He took off at a fast walk across the parking lot...no limp.
* We've seen men walking down the sidewalk like normal. We come back around through town and see them limping with a cane with a cardboard sign begging for money.
* I walked into a grocery store and saw a homeless man sitting on the ground outside the door tearing a piece of cardboard and writing on it.
* Brother Jim talked to a man on a corner outside a grocery store and the man didn't need anything except money. Of course we don't give out money and he got the gospel. Later that night his wife called asking for money to get groceries. She said they can't make it to the food pantry because their car broke down. Brother Jim offered to pay for a taxi to get them there and they didn't want it.
* We saw a woman beggar who said she was from Texas, had 2 children who were cold and hungry and her husband was disabled. (Said they were trying to get gas and money to get to Florida.) She said they were sitting over at McDonalds (across the street), hungry and so we went over there. We saw the man with 2 children, piles of food all over the table and the man and children were on internet phones, well dressed and full. We have since seen her standing on many corners around the state.
* Many of the homeless are carrying very large, very heavy backpacks yet say they are disabled.
* We've seen them out begging for food for their animal but it must be either grain free or organic.
* We were walking through a parking lot and saw a sleeping bag alongside the road and when we looked around we saw a man walking quickly over there to get it. We kept walking along the other side of the parking lot and not to much later we saw him stuffing it all into a van.
* We had this one happen today. We were in our van with the door open getting ready to go down the road when a beggar woman came up to the door asking for a cigarette. We said we didn't smoke and before she could get a gospel card she left. As we were leaving the parking lot and saw her on the corner begging so we pulled over, gave her a small food packet that we give to beggars and asked her story. She said her husband just went to jail and she just had a relative die. (We hear that often.) She got the gospel. Brother Jim tested her too, he asked her if the store gets upset about beggars being on their corner and she said 'No, only if there are a lot of them at one time.' (Proves she does this a lot.)
I'm not doing this to cut anyone down, to belittle beggars or not love my neighbor because we do, we try to help each one of them just like we would help someone who wasn't a beggar. I do this because when we watch these beggars for a while we see the vast majority of the people they get their money from are women.
So I appeal to you sisters, be very wise as to how you deal with beggars.
Something to think about...we constantly hear (directly from them) that churches, food pantries and people are always giving them food so they won't starve. There are shelters all over America that provide food, beds, showers and training to get jobs. I recall one time we heard about a park not far from our old homestead in WI that was filled with homeless people in December. (WI is a very cold winter state.) I called the city hall and talked to the woman there to see if this was true, what was being done and what we could do to help but she said they all had found places in their relatives homes. She said she wasn't sure what the town would do with them to get them in homes if their relatives kicked them out. I asked about shelters in the area and she said there are several.....but get this....
THEY DIDN'T WANT TO GO
They didn't want to go an hour and a half away from where they were. None were working, they were eating off the food banks and now off their relatives and because they didn't want to go to some of the vacant shelters who would help them get off the street, get jobs, housing vouchers, clothes etc to get them going again...that town had to deal with them.
Not one time have we met a beggar that wants off the street.
In fact we meet so many men that say they can't work yet they drive cars, lug big back packs around and stand for hours on the corners in the heat and cold. Then on the other hand we see men in wheel chairs working 12 hr shifts, elderly men who are in ther 80's working as a greeter, elderly women pulling an oxygen tank cleaning restrooms, very disabled young men working as stockers etc.
Money won't help them but the gospel will. That's what we share with them, the good news along with a little food bag we have made up for them to show love and an offer to help them in the things of God or to get off the street.
Take it for whatever it's worth and make good decisions on how you deal with beggars.
Have a joyous day sisters.
Have a blessed evening.
Love in Christ,
Sister Deb
The biblical gospel...