Brown Lee

January 2-5, I went to Atlanta, GA for the Passion Conference. At the conference, 22,000 people joined together for worship over this four day period. While this was a great opportunity to meet many of those people, I felt so broken as I walked down the streets and observed one of the largest homeless communities in the world. Amos 5 was on my mind, where it talks of how we walk past the poor, the broken, and all other injustices to come to "worship." But God responds in verses 21-24, "I hate, I reject your festivals...Take away from Me the noise of your songs; I will not even listen to the sound of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." I could write an entire blog about how this passage has effected my life, but for now, I just want to share one story with you.

One of the easiest responses to this passage is to simply not walk past the poor and broken. I had the privilege of taking a couple homeless people to breakfast or dinner, including my friend Louis, who I was able to take to breakfast each morning. One evening, however, I was looking for a place to eat and stumbled upon a Burger King/Popeye's Chicken. To be honest, I am not a fan of either but they had the shortest lines in the area. So I went in and got in line to order from Popeye's. As I was ordering, a tall, black man stumbled in and was trying to order. It was quite obvious that he was both homeless and a bit drunk. The employees kept trying to get him to leave because he had no money, but I ended up telling them that he was with me and so I let him order with me.

The room was divided: black homeless men on the right and white college students on the left. But since I let this man order with me, he agreed to let me sit with him and his other homeless friends. Many times, I see events like this as a divine appointment from God, and a wonderful opportunity to share the Gospel with them. So I kept trying to explain to him that the reason I did this for him was because Jesus did a similar thing for me. It really wasn't much of a conversation, as all of his words were slurred due to the alcohol and the fact that he only had one tooth. But I just kept nodding my head as if I understood.

When I was finished, I got up to throw my trash away and returned to the table to make sure I wasn't leaving anything behind. Once I checked everything, I said goodbye to my new friend and I started walking about a half mile back to the arena for the conference. As I walked through the doors of the arena, I reached for my bag and realized that I didn't have it. I thought I had checked everything before I left Popeye's. My bag had my Bible and notebook, my wallet, my camera, and several other items. I quickly prayed to God about it as I ran back to Popeye's to see if it was still there. As I walked in, my bag was missing, as was the man I had just eaten with.

Another homeless man, Andre, stood up and said he saw Brown Lee take my bag. I asked who Brown Lee was, and Andre told me that he was the guy I was eating with. Apparently, when I stood up to throw away my trash, Brown Lee took my bag right off my chair. I asked Andre where I could find Brown Lee and he simply just told me to follow him.

For the next 20 minutes, or so, Andre and I walked the streets of Atlanta. We walked down alleys, we walked through ghettos, and we walked through many areas that I would not really recommend you doing. We walked around corners and large, black men would stand up and just stare me down, but each time Andre would respond to them, "He's with me." Occasionally I would follow that up with, "Yes, I am with Andre."

Eventually we came to Brown Lee, who was sitting at a bus stop hoping to get out of town with my bag. Luckily we caught him in time and Andre demanded that he give me my stuff back. Brown Lee replied that the bag was his, to which I pleaded with him, reminding him that I had just bought him dinner. Andre eventually made a deal with him to where he gave Brown Lee his toboggan in exchange for my bag. What an incredible thing! I ended up giving Andre the rest of the money in my wallet (which really wasn't much), as a thank you and so that he could get himself a new toboggan. Andre really helped me out.

This story was a great illustration for me of the Gospel. First off, Andre had no obligation to me, yet he gave up all he had (truly, that was all he had) to buy back my bag. Isn't that exactly what God did? He has zero obligation to us, sinners we are. But for some reason, He showed us grace. "He gave up His one and only son" (John 3:16) to redeem our lives.

The second illustration that Andre showed me comes from 2 Timothy 2:5. It says that there is one mediator between man and God, and that is Christ Jesus. There is absolutely no way that we will get to heaven based off our good works. Our works are like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). There is no way that we are going to just sneak into heaven, either. We need a mediator. We need someone who can speak on our behalf: Christ. There is no way I could walk around those dark alleys by myself (I forgot to mention this was later in the evening). Many rose to challenge me and question why I was there. But each time, Andre replied, "He is with me." To you who have a relationship with Jesus: He will do the same thing when we get to heaven. We will pass through those entrance gates, completely full of sin, but His righteousness will cover us as He says, "He/She is with me."