Often the best thing you can do for a homeless person is give them a lot of good food or a nice sleeping bag. God will repay. I guarantee it or your money back. Should one start a homeless shelter? Yes if one wants to. I had one before I got married and we had a blast.
A lot of young people want to leave home. Some have to.
If you want to have a lot of laughs and see yourself grow up again take in some homeless girls or young women. It is a zoo.
I go to a Pentecostal church and made them go too. Yet they liked it. We could cut up at home, turn on the radio, dance in the kitchen, share secrets, wrestle. Some of those girls acted so funny and I had to hold their hand and drag them out for a walk. Then we go to church and pretend to be normal. We got to line dancing in church.
Because I ran away as a teenager I know all the pitfalls. Everybody has to work. And stay in constant prayer for each other to keep the wolves away.
The welfare office has a program that will reimburse you for taking someone off the street. I paid my fire insurance that way one year.
Will you get ripped off? Well, maybe. Hide the good stuff for your own piece of mind. But ask yourself if it is worth giving up a chair or a skillet or whatever you might lose? Or is friendship more valuable? And use intuition. I didn”t allow drinking or smoking. Don”t let any suspected drug dealers in. You can ask people to replace the food they use.
Just the other day I got a call from an old “homie” asking if I wanted to play drums in a band. I can barely play guitar, but do love a party. The good book says if you take in the helpless wanderer your health will spring forth speedily. That”s because you”re gonna need it.
Shanon Taylor is a Lake County artist and writer.
