When so many of our neighbors in LA experience homelessness, it can seem overwhelming to think of where to begin. What difference can one person make? What could one congregation do?
I got the chance to see one congregation’s ministry in action last weekend. First Pres Hollywood hosts a Winter Refuge for 3 months each year. (Read more here.) They personally invite people into their church meeting hall for 3 months and emphasize rest, friendship, and connection.
Whenever I go to the Winter Refuge, I am in awe at how much it really does feel like a safe haven, and like I’m standing on Holy Ground. Volunteers and staff cultivate a caring environment where people who have experienced the untold traumas of living outside have a chance to breathe in peace and receive love.
Our group brought burritos, rice, salad, chips with homemade salsa, and freshly baked desserts. Serving the enchilada sauce was my one way ticket to becoming the most popular person in the room! The group from our church was invited to eat alongside everyone who called the Winter Refuge home for this time. Who doesn’t love burritos?
It’s no accident our dinner conversation naturally drifted to the migration of monarch butterflies and other animals that migrate long distances.
Monarchs aren’t the only creatures who’ve been on the move for a long while.
Then we sang! Our church’s music director, Tom Zehnder, just happened to bring his guitar, and we had a vibrant sing-a-long.
And that’s how we came to sing Take Me Home, Country Roads by John Denver. If you don’t know it, the song is about longing to return to West Virginia but most of all a desire to be at home and a place to belong.
I couldn’t help but wonder how this song sounds to someone who’s been on the street. Is there a place they long for? Are they still welcome there? Or have they vowed never to return? Do the lyrics hit a tender spot?
Or is there a recognition of a common longing for a place to belong? Perhaps even that they’ve found a place to belong? I’d like to think so.
The new friends we sang with have been on my mind as the song echoes days later. What struck me most after this visit is how welcoming our new friends were and how many of them wanted to stay and sing with us. I get it. A sing-a-long isn’t for everyone, no matter the songs.
And yet, they wanted to sit with us and wanted to sing. Many requested old standbys like The Old Rugged Cross and Amy Grant’s Thy Word.
I came away immensely humbled and grateful that people who had experienced trauma upon trauma were so open, gracious, and just conversational with us whom they would likely never see again.
Our paths crossed briefly but I am deeply moved by the encounter. And while I don’t know their stories, I pray for each of them that the stability and peace they’ve experienced at the refuge would grow and flourish. And I pray for all of us, that the joy we created together would spread.
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Thank you for reading Almost Named Grace with Frances Rosenau. This post is public so feel free to share it.
~What I’m reading~
The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman
Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
Lovely. The song I think has become some sort of archetypal expression of our longing for home. I loved to hear and sing it even coming from another continent. Makes me want to finally visit West Virginia now 😇
Very nice piece, Frances. A few years ago, I was an assistant pastor to a missional church in Gardena, CA that was an outreach to the homeless in the area. I don't know who was blessed more, the people I had the privilege of working with or myself, because of my personal spiritual growth. I learned so many lessons from the homeless and one that still resonates is that to them, their community is home, they just happen to be houseless. Thank you for this, Frances.