"The poor you will have with you, always".
Sometimes we take it for granted that there will be bums. We call them bums because, well because that's what they are. No job. No place to stay. No, no lots of things that we think "normal" people should have.
Not having and doing "normal" stuff tends to make other "normal" people uneasy. A label helps categorize and marginalize and prioritize them right out of our life.
Except sometimes and some people don't. The Mango Man, as he was nicknamed, was one of those people. He wasn't a beggar. He was just one of those guys that sat around. Not clean cut. Not "respectable" not a lot of things that people generally try to be.
In his neighborhood in Hawaii they could have called the cops. They could have run him out. They didn't. They let him stay. They'd drop by his bench and say hi, and after he got hit by a car they pitched in to buy him a new walker.
Hawaii Neighborhood Rallies Together To Save Beloved Homeless Man
"The poor you will have with you, always".
It's true, we will always have poor. It doesn't mean they don't count. It just means they are poor. Sometimes we are richer for having them, because it gives us a chance to give.
I think Jesus was referring to the short duration of his stay on earth, compared to the fact that the poor the Pharisees were worrying about would always be around. He was also gently chastising, I think, for obsessing on the wrong stuff and ignoring what was truly important.
ReplyDeleteI like the recent story of the little boy who bought a meal for a homeless gentleman in a restaurant, and then prayed with him over it. That little boy is one of God's true treasures. IIRC, the mom might have told him at some point about how angels walk the earth, and you never know when you will encounter one.
I always wonder about the life history and experiences fellows like mango man had that led them to where they currently are. He could be a Vietnam vet who found that reinsertion into regular life was not easy to do. I can understand that. Once you go through war, life here in the states has to be quite the disconnect. Especially if you live in a paradise like Hawaii.