Homeless Steve’s Redemption Story

It was almost five years exactly to the day since I saw you, sat with you, talked with you the very first time.

Five years, since I drove through our local Starbucks and handed you a Venti….Yes, probably just to make myself feel better because you were freezing, and I was in a new, well heated automobile.

The forecast was 11 degrees. You were standing there with your mongrel, while my youngest daughter, at the time, generously scrambled for anything she could find to give you.

• One child rescued, another driven to the streets by their circumstances.
• One a success story, the other a statistic.
• One given every opportunity, another fighting hopelessness in the dead of winter, after his friend just overdosed from heroin.

And I wonder, why do some people’s paths wind one way, some another. Some find light earlier, others remain lost in the dead of winter?

Still, five years ago, I saw past your ragged clothes, through crystal blue eyes to the longing of your soul.

You needed resolution to a life that beat and bruised you, tossed you aside to become a beggar, desperate for warmth amongst the rigid and self-protecting.

But Steve, you are who Jesus lives for, the answer to this world’s self-centeredness.

It was you, not some flashy add, or wealthy person, or great saint in some cathedral….but YOU that broke me from my shell of greediness and self-inflation.

And I thank God He not only gave me eyes to see you, but mobilized my feet to go up and talk to you; me the beggar, you the teacher.

I want my children to see feet and a mission, not just useless sympathy and pity, only reaching shallow lips.

And what was it? The thousands that prayed for you after reading the blog post I wrote about you over the years? The one when I sat with you and my daughter (here), or came back a year later and introduced you to my husband (here)?

What I do know is that I didn’t recognize you the other day. I didn’t recognize anything about you at first….until I saw those eyes. 

Because outfits and new clothes, and great advice can fool most of us, most of the time; but eyes that reach souls and touch lives, those true windows to our souls…never lie…

Never fool anybody.

Five years later. Winter. About a week after another cold burst that locked the ground in ice and forced me to scrape frost off my windshields, saw you.

I must have needed the defrosting again of my very own soul as I raced around shopping for Christmas, because no meeting is happenstance. And clearly, every soul we encounter, is God appointed.

I was stuck in traffic. Thinking nothing about poverty, homelessness, or anything else useful, for that matter.

In fact, I was likely self-focused; worrying about how “I” would get everything I needed for Christmas, “I” would wrap all the presents, “I” might find the perfect stocking stuffers, so everyone would enjoy the Christmas “I” so impressively put together.

It was then, I saw those eyes. Deep, soul-looking eyes staring at me from the bus stop, as I waited in traffic a few rows away from you.

The eyes locked in. They were piercing. Strangely, I wasn’t offended by them, but instead captivated by the bearded man I didn’t recognize gripping my heart by his look.

As the cars started moving, I let my eyes scan your situation to see if I could gather who you were or why this man was staring at me, from a spot near the bus stop.

Your eyes wouldn’t let go. But I didn’t get it, didn’t recognize you…couldn’t have known. Outward appearances often deceive us.

You were a man on a newer cell phone, clean clothes, and a newer bike. Not ragged, filthy, or holding a sign near your self-created cart…the one you used to wheel your scroungy dog upon in the dead of night and the cold of winter.

Where was your dog, best friend, the faithfully furry guy that never left your side then? Did you lose him too?

This time, I didn’t see layers of torn or stained clothes, but a man that exuberated love, quiet, carrying well-groomed strength and dignity. Another man stood by you, not known to you, but also not avoiding you….like so many had done in the past.

Your face seemed less wrinkled. Your countenance tall and unapolegentic. I knew something had changed, outward, not necessarily inward…

Because eyes don’t lie, and hard situations don’t really change us, they just reveal the truth of what’s been hidden, deeping inside all along….

And you, to me, always seemed to shine.

I passed you slowly, with the egging traffic.

And I am sorry to say, I was too far passed when my mind caught your eyes and was taken back to that day in the parking lot; your rambling about the missing lady, or when you carried your friend in a body bag, out from under the bridge with two police officers.

Yet, we were not that different, you and I. And by your stare, you clearly remembered. Still again, here at Christmas, priorities find their way home in the truth of the love of a God who made us both.

What I gave you was little, petty, and what you held back then, in your homelessness, was still so much more than I have ever possessed….

And instead of stopping to share with you, how I wish the world could gather at your feet, so they could hear your redemption story, learn from someone who has been through the fire and has come out beaming.

I long to know what drove you from your plight, gave you hope and a light to find your way in the dark….

Was it words of some stranger, a local shelter you said you refused to go to, or God inside you, walking you faithfully through a valley, the one both of us have struggled to find our way in this life, from time to time?

I don’t know, but when I recognized you, it was too late. Too late to go back, turn around, stop, make it through the traffic to hear the words of a life turned around.

Still, those eyes will always remain…remain lazered into my soul. Yet, I didn’t recognize the man who taught me so much, and gave me the gift of friendship, in a world where the more material things we gain often are an attempt at compensating for what inwardly we lack.

And if the world could learn from you, what would you say to them?

• Lightness is brighter after the dark?
• Warmth is most savored, after seasons of freezing?
• People are the connection that brings life in the aching of a world where it’s just you and a dog fending for yourselves?

Oh, how I wish I could learn from you still. Somehow find you again, and hear your story of redemption.

It’s a good one. I know it. Those piercing blue eyes spoke a million words as I crept slowly past you in my vehicle, missing the wealth you possessed in your poverty.

So, this Christmas….almost exactly five years past when I first say you, I remember the cold, the warmth, your story of hope and need, and lack, and want….

And count my own life shallow and needy, lacking, and longing for enriching, of the conversations I once had on a freezing day, with a homeless man….

Named Steve.