SOS Week

For years my church, St. Paul Lutheran of Royal Oak, has been a part of the South Oakland Shelter program. For more years than I've been a member, certainly ... 20, 25? Every year for the week after Easter, while the day school kids are on break, St. Paul houses 30 or so homeless adults (and a varying number of children).

It takes dozens of volunteers and hundreds of hours. We provide meals for the week, a safe and warm place to sleep and get cleaned up, transportation to their jobs or job training programs, encouragement, peace, and a listening ear when it's needed. One of our members is a beauty school instructor, so she brings a bunch of her students over on Saturday morning to do free simple haircuts. The people in the program stay at a different church every week, so picture 52 churches opening their doors and giving of themselves to make this happen. Really, it is a remarkable program, when you think about it.

 I must confess that there have been years when I've done very little to help out. Maybe I've donated a little money or food here and there. But this year, I wanted to do more. I wanted to do something that might be a little costly. So, for Tuesday night, I served as one of the women night watchers, along with one of my best friends. (The week was more costly for my friend, bless her heart, since she did night watch duty again on Thursday night!) We were there from about 6:30 in the evening until 7:30 the next morning, when all of our guests had gone for the day. 

Pulling an "all-nighter," as we used to call them in school, was lots of fun, actually (mostly we talked, and played a little "Angry Birds" on my friend's iPad) ... until we hit the wall about 4 a.m. Then the hours started to drag a bit, and we may have dozed off lightly. I'll just say that it was great to see the lady making breakfast arrive about 5:30, rousing us to alertness and giving us something to do .

Yes, I was pretty much a zombie on Wednesday, despite catching a nap when I got home. But it was worth the sacrifice of sleep to chat and encourage these people who are working so hard to get their lives back together. And on Thursday, when I was packing up 30 sack lunches for our guests, I was able to picture (and pray for) the real people who would be eating those salami, bologna, and PB&J sandwiches.