Brian's Posterous

Jesus Finds a Home in a Homeless Man

Saturday night Paul (see previous post) said he wanted to give his life over to Jesus and be baptized. He spent all day Saturday praying and crying. But he said they were different kind of tears - tears of hope, even though he was afraid to have hope.

He said he was afraid to do this, but more afraid not to. He was mostly afraid of failing God. I told him he would still have falls but to just fall on God's grace. He said he had run from God all his life and now it was the only place he had left to go.

We waited until everyone left the church and I baptized him. He was tearful. It was a special moment.

I stopped by his spot this morning. He told me he read all of one of the books I gave him - "Same Kind of Different as Me." He loved it and wants to talk about it. I have a lot of hope for him.

I'm so thankful that we have a God that sincerely loves Paul.

Great Day w/ Homeless Man

I had a good day today. Really good. Spent most of it with Paul. Paul is one of the 700+ homeless in Longmont. He's been homeless off and on for about 20 years. He has been sober a few months. We talked about life, pain, God, books, drinking, feeling lost, trust, forgiveness, John Lennon, etc. We had sub sandwiches. Starbucks. Prayed. He got to take a shower at the church. He loves to read. Bought him some books. Had several very meaningful conversations. Good guy.

Here are two quotable quotes he said during our talks.
"Satan comes in liquid form for me."
"They call it 'life on the streets.' It's not. It's 'existence on the streets.' There is no life."

We brought each other closer to Jesus today. I really believe that.

Haitian Proverb

On the day of the Haitian earthquake, I had just finished reading a book entitled "Mountains Beyond Mountains," by Tracy Kidder. It’s a biography of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Harvard physician (and Ph.D. anthropologist) who tirelessly works for Haitians living in the central plateau of Haiti. Haiti was a disaster before the earthquake, and people wondered even then "Where was God?" I found this nugget of wisdom in this book that comes from a Haitian proverb:

How could a just God permit great misery? The Haitian peasants answered with a proverb: “Bondye konn bay, men li pa konn separe,” in literal translation, “God gives but doesn’t share.” This meant, as Farmer would later explain it, “God gives us humans everything we need to flourish, but he’s not the one who’s supposed to divvy up the loot. That charge was laid upon us.” (Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World. p79).

(download)

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Haitian_Proverb.zip (6 KB)

Pray for Haiti

Free Audio Book Every Month

If you don’t know about ChristianAudio.com, you should check it out. One of my best friends, Cory Verner, helped create this site. They take some of the more thoughtful Christian books and create audio versions of them. Most of them come in 3 formats, CD’s, MP3 CD’s, and MP3 downloads.

I'm Blogging Again

Ok, after a several year hiatus, I'm back in the blogosphere [www.brianmavis.com]. I plan on posting stuff on Facebook and Twitter too. Prepare to experience more good vibes.

Seth Godin explains well why I'm back in the game.