iBelin

Blessed to Be a Blessing

// April 9th, 2010 // 7 Comments » // Discipline, Homelessness, hunger

Spending time mumbling, grumbling and complaining about what you don’t have is the biggest joy and peace killer in the world. Why? because when you are focused on what you don’t have you are not enjoying and thanking God for what you do have…

You are blessed! If you are alive, you are blessed. Hey! for that matter, if you are reading this, you are blessed. So give up the mumbling, grumbling and complaining and exchange these for love, gratitude and service.

Seriously, complaining people are miserable and no fun to be around. Moreover, when you help someone else, you boost your value in your own mind and you polish off some of the “patina” on your self-image.

Want to know who I’m using my blessings to bless? Click here! BUT NOT BEFORE YOU LEAVE A COMMENT WITH YOUR THOUGHTS BELOW (I am sooooo serious)!!!

I Live In Hope*

// April 5th, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Homelessness, hunger

The Resurrection of Jesus Christ gives hope to the hopeless. I live in that hope.

I live in hope that more and more citizens of Middle Tennessee will have the blessing of shelter.
I live in hope that hungry men, women and children will find permanent, regular and consistent means to food.
I live in hope that more and more people will open their eyes and hearts to really see our homeless sisters and brothers.
I live in hope that dignity be restored to men and women whose lives have been devastated by poverty.
I live in hope that people who are homeless will no longer be treated as criminals.
I live in hope that children will eat a sufficient amount of healthy food to feed their minds and their bodies.
I live in hope that those who recognize they are blessed will commit to be blessings to others.
I live in hope that Middle Tennesseans will rise to the challenge before us and give hope to the hungry and homeless.
I live in hope that people and organizations will come together in partnerships to support the work of organizations that produce results.
I live in hope that people from different backgrounds and beliefs will collaborate to find new solutions for old problems of homelessness and hunger.

When a negative reality has persisted over time, there is a temptation to lose hope that reality can change. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ restores hope to the hopeless, the homeless and the hungry.
I live in hope. I am the change.

*I’m going to share what I’m learning and doing about homelessness and hunger in a series which this post begins.
(Photo by Maggie Smith)

I WILL HELP.

// December 30th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Homelessness, Nashville

I took my parents to the Nashville Public Library Downtown because they wanted to get out of my house and it’s one of the nicest spaces in the southeast. When we entered, we stumbled upon an exhibit “art makes place”. Part of this exhibit included these fliers with tear off tabs much like the ones often seen in the environs of college campuses on bulletin boards and telephone polls. While these fliers are often advertisements for goods and services, these fliers sported a simple commitment: “I WILL HELP”. Help who? Help with what? That the flier provided no answer to my questions engaged me.

As we continued on our tour of the library, I smelled the unpleasant smell of uncleanness. That smell transported me back twenty-five years or so to the old downtown library I frequented when I was in high school. It was then I first had an inkling of what people have to do to survive when they are homeless. The public men’s rooms became their bathrooms of sorts where they could try to clean up as much as possible.

While we moved through the Courtyard, the Grand Reading Room, the Civil Rights Room, the Fine Arts Reading Room, the periodicals and the amazing children’s area there were men, women and children of all ages and hues who seemed to be at home in the library while on the computers, reading newspapers and periodicals, carrying on conversations (sometimes with invisible conversation partners), and sleeping…

My parents and I had dinner reservations and I was hurrying them along so as not to be caught at closing time and risk missing our reservation. As I kept looking at my phone to keep track of time, I was aware that closing time at the library meant something completely different to many people in the library than it did to me. While I was on my way to dinner with my family, many other people would be released onto cold wet streets with theirs.

Looking forward from the threshold of a new year, there are things I must put behind me. The smiles, the smells, the overheard conversations, the eyes of the people old and young in the Downtown Nashville Public Library are not among them. They are my answer.

(Click here for more on Ending Homelessness in Nashville.)