Several weeks ago a speaker in chapel talked about compassion. Honest compassion. And that hit me hard. Have I lost true compassion,that I feel sorry for homeless people, widowed people, orphans, and those who are ill but lack honest and true compassion? Did I ever have honest compassion in the first place; compassion that moved my heart which moved my hands to action (as a speaker said in chapel this week)? I dont know, I guess I have thought about that alot since then.
Last Tuesday night, there was an ice cream party at the youth ministry building on campus and one of the speakers for this week in chapel was there to hang out with us. Several people were asking him questions and one question was what can we do in our community to help those less fortunate since we dont see any homeless people. There is a mobile home community literally on the other side of the fence next to the youth ministry building. There is also another mobile home community on the other side of the lake. And I know I have driven by at least two more mobile home communities in the Warsaw area. I dont know the situations of those that live in the mobile home communities or if they are anything like the situations of the families that live in mobile homes back in Coal Valley, IL. Several times I have thought about going over there and talking to the people next to the youth min. building (literally our neighbors). The only thing holding me back: I do not know of anyone willing to go with me for safety reasons. I would be more than happy to go by myself, but I know that is not safe. On one occasion, my Break Out group needed to do a service project in the fall, I suggested giving candy or some form of treat or service to the people in the mobile homes; I was turned down instantly. There are many great opportunities to serve in this area: tutoring, soup kitchens, community projects, service projects, disaster relief helping, and many others. I dont know, maybe I am wrong (I hope I am wrong) but it seems like the people in the Mobile Communities might be left out. Maybe its just because I got to work in the mobile community a couple years ago, other wise I probably wouldn't be noticing right now.
I was at WalMart last night getting groceries. I was looking at the soup and a lady behind me asked if I was shopping for a family or for myself. I said I was just a college student shopping for myself. We had a small conversation about me going to Grace and how she has a child that lives near Grace now. We ended up talking about how expensive food is now days. She mentioned that they didn't have food last week; she got $200 from her husband tonight so she could get groceries. She mentioned that she has five kids and two of them live out of the house. She motioned to her cart and it was competely full with soup cans and other groceries: all of that so far came to about $96 and she still needed to get some kind of meat. Her daughter came over and I talked to her a little bit (she had gone to a concert that she won tickets for on the radio, and she was pretty excited about that).
Made me think about all of those huge, beautiful mansions that are over in Winona Lake, Warsaw, and just past Grace College. Those huge houses out by the golf courses or those houses that over-look the lake.
There is one housing division with gorgeous houses that over-look Winona Lake and some of those houses have their backs to some kind of woods. On the other side of those woods, tucked away where no one can see is a mobile home community that seems to flood very easily.
i guess these are just some of the ramblings inside of my heart & head.
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