(The names have been changed… the story remains the same).

I remember once, My Mother, Aunt, and I went to a pretty scary part of Washington D.C. to spread a little love to a Mom named Hope and her kids; the family was dealing with the passing of a family member and an abusive Husband/Father. We had been asked by a close friend of ours to come and do some “Surging” for a day.

We prepared to go in with our happy-hearted “let us love on you” smiles to bless the family with whatever we had; whether it was a worship song, counseling, some words of peace, a clean house, or a combination of them all… we planned to go into the home and fill it with JESUS.

We had heard that the family’s living conditions were not the greatest and honestly, I had never been to any “bad” part of D.C. before and thus, was completely ignorant to the fact that such poverty existed there. Absolutely nothing could have prepared us for what we saw…

The house was obviously old from the outside. It was raining so that didn’t exactly help things. But when we came inside I knew… we had just stepped into a third world country, right there in the middle of one of the most powerful cities in the world!

We wore work clothes because we had been told that some painting and new furniture was desperately needed there. That was the understatement of the century…

I can remember picking up a side table as we tried to clear the living room out for a remodel and watching pieces of it fall to the ground, disintegrating into shreds of dirt onto the broken floor. I had never seen such filth inside a home before.

My valiant Aunt Susan took one for the team and got herself a protective suit to clean the mold ridden bathroom. As she tried to scrub the walls, the water that came out of the faucets was mostly brown! This is what they bathed in, brushed their teeth with…

As we cleaned and painted and talked with the Mother, Hope’s family members came in and out whispering and protesting against us; they could not believe anyone would ever come to help their sister WITHOUT WANTING SOMETHING IN RETURN.

They had obviously known about God and may have even believed in Him, once. But as we painted, replaced furniture and household essentials, I noticed that hurt and bitterness had utterly overshadowed these women’s lives. It was going to take a wind of miracles to rush through that home and breathe HIS Life into their hearts.

Even when faced with a handful of people who wanted to love them, this family took hours and hours to warm up to us. Real LOVE, as found only in Christ, was so completely foreign to them, they felt the need to protect Hope rather than rejoice with her.

Hope was so broken from life’s events, she just kept crying, calling us “Angels.” Her children walked around, silent at first, but eventually opened up a little to the random people picking up their house. They were curious… but delighted.

There were knick knacks and pieces of laundry strewn all around the aging home. It seemed as if it would take weeks to do what really needed to be done there. But all we had was ONE DAY.

You know what’s funny?

Our cleaning and painting, and moving things was wonderful, but what eventually got the family’s heart was our DESIRE to do it. You can bless people all day long, but if your heart is not in it, it is as filthy rags to the Father (1 Corinth. 4:5). You see, when your motives are all wrong, people quickly catch on to the fact that you are only using them as a part of your religious “to do list.”

That day, we CHOSE to have excellence in our work and compassion in our hearts.

So often we do what we believe are such grand things for the Lord. Such as, give our lunch away to a homeless man or say “Praise the Lord” in public… when all we are really doing is what we as Christians should be EXPECTED to do.

Living a righteous life should always be full of generous moments. Moments of ACKNOWLEDGING THE INVISIBLE and LOVING THE UNLOVABLE.

Think about it… It’s not easy to be raised in the ghetto with parents who were not educated enough to teach you how to clean; it’s difficult not having enough money to get clear bathing water or be so BROKEN you do not have the strength to wash your children’s clothes…

This was a daily reality for Hope’s family…

And when lives are shattered right before the eyes of a child of God, it should be a PRIVILEGE to offer those who are hurting, a hand in picking up the pieces.

We are not heroes for helping. We are simply BELIEVERS.

Stone hearts become flesh when you realize what genuine Love can do. Compassion flows and peace comes through bearing someone else’s burdens…even if it is only for a moment.

Needless to say… Hope’s family eventually began to accept that we wanted nothing from them. Her sister’s even opened up to us and explained that they had never seen “Church People” do something like this for someone else before. They kept saying, “Now this is what Church should be! This is Church!”

They were right.

We ended the night with a mini worship session and left the home in the hands of God.

I know we will never forget Hope and her family … The SURGE was the tool God used to help them, but the work He did in us will last forever.

Sympathy is one thing, but being right there in the midst of someone’s pain with them guides your heart to a deeper place with God.

There are hurting people out there. And you don’t have to fly to Africa to find them. Just look across the street, someone might need your kind eyes and encouraging words right now.

You never know what a SURGE OF LOVE could do.

Catch the Wave,
Victoria