N was at the kerb looking jumpy, like she was about to run the lights against a wave of traffic. She’s obviously a junkie, one that had been punched in the eye recently with a black bruise on her left lower eye socket.
I am moved to interact with her ..
“Hey you look like you are in a race … what’s happenin?”. …
“I gotta get out of here, I’ve just been belted …. They stole my $70 … (few expletives)”.
“Hey what’s wrong with your leg?
“I got pain in the foot, pain in the thigh … (she’s ramblin about a lot of other stuff now, so I say “I want to pray for your right leg, Jesus wants to give you pain relief”).
N stops rambling now & says OK.
I tell the pain to leave because Jesus blesses.
The pedestrian light goes walk, so we do.
N is telling me she is a junkie, points to a vein in her throat that has track marks; she’s just tried to score, they punched her & stole her money. She is still jumpy & I think she will run soon to get away from the area.
We get to the other side, I ask her :
“How’s the leg now?”
She thinks about it & replies:
“Hey it’s pretty good ….. or it might be the way I’m standing on it … feels good tho”.
(P , my wife is there) Now we have her full attention.
She wants to pray for us.
She is saying things like you won’t hurt me will you, I’ve been hurt by strangers, you look ok to me though; I’m estranged from my son.
We ask if she wants a coffee … she wants it iced. We say we are off to Friday night church…. Do you want to go?
“You’ll take me home? You won’t hurt me?”
She seems to have many addresses she calls home; it depends on who she is getting on with at the time.
So we feed her and speak into her life for the next couple of hours.
Jesus has enormous love for her and wants her future to be established.
N is taking these things in, then being cheeky, then falling asleep as she eats. It seems to be a cycle as I keep waking her. Some of her humour is based on getting windfalls by suing the establishment for damages.
N is keen to go to church, now, she is looking forward to it as much as she would be to score!
She firmly tells us that we can only talk to one person each about her plight.
In the meeting she wants me to stand up to tell everyone what happened with her.
I think that she has seen this meeting procedure before, so I tell her it won’t be like that, at this place.
We walk up 2 or 3 flights of steps to where the meeting is held in a factory.
The band is warming up … N looks pretty cool like she is at a rock concert. She starts talking excitedly to people after being quiet just previously. I think it is funny.
P goes off to freshen up and N wants to go too.
N falls asleep in the toilet. P freshens her up a little.
She sits between us in the 2nd row. The 1st worship song. N stands but soon is doubled over falling asleep drooling onto the front seat; it’s vinyl covered and no one is sitting there yet. P is keen to look after her but I indicate that we should just let things happen.
After the 1st song some people have moved to the front but the band stops for announcements. N is getting jack of it and wants to go. She walks out through a few people, past the announcer. N stops, turns around, looks back at everyone. It is like something has just occurred to her. She comes back, finds some carpet and sits down between the announcer and the musicians on stage, facing the stage, dead middle.
When worship in song resumes she takes off her windcheater, makes a little pillow of it and goes to sleep. Other people start lying down to soak in the Spirit around her. I’m praying she gets so soaked that drugs will not appeal to her in future. I ask Jesus to take away her eye bruising as a sign to her and me that things are changing for her.
Worship finishes and the preacher preaches a good word on new ways for Holy Ghost meetings in the future (away from preacher to audience meetings), angelic helps and encounters with Jesus. He walks around the sleeping N many times during the word.
Just before he finishes his message, N wakes up, turns on her knees to face the audience and yells out “Sooorryyyy” then knee walks 10m back to me then yells out “I got a cramp in my calf, grab it” I grab it & pray for the cramp to go. She jumps up saying, its ok its ok, and sits down between us. D is finishing his message mentioning several times how angels help us. N yells out “Angels” twice (like you gotta be jokin).
D doesn’t miss a beat. Then she yells out “angels? angels? These 2 people here are angels”, pointing to P & me. D says “yes, isn’t love wonderful”. As he finishes his message, N is rolling a smoke, I’m thinking : will she light up in here? But she does a dash for the door & down the steps. I’ll pick her up on the way out; but within a minute or 2 she is back with us, (what’s that about !)
D then calls a prayer time.
I say to N she should go for prayer.
She replies “no, not going out there …. Too embarrassed ….. too ashamed…..”
“Well , time to take you home then” It was at least 10:30pm.
She starts to pick up her things then turns to me “I’ll go out if you go out.”
So I pick the far left, even though D looks to be starting personal prayer in the middle.
He comes directly to us, saying let’s have prayer for the fiery ones (what has he seen?!).
I direct his attention to N. D says to me “OK, come on, let’s pray for her”.
N wants the drug problem to go. D asks for her body chemistry to change so drugs will not be needed. He gives her words about her past and the healing in her future. Then we say how much Jesus loves her. D has both her hands, then says here it comes now … there it is …
and bang N drops to her knees like she has taken a big hit.
D moves to the next person while I wait for N’s next move. She is motionless on her knees then she shakes her head like she is regaining consciousness, wipes her eyes and gets up.
P has come over and we can see her eyes in the light; they are so clear.
She is smiling and I notice her bruised eye is almost completely reduced – God is Good.
N looks at us & says wondrously “WHAT WAS THAT … I feel like I’ve had some cones but without any of the bad effects”, she is obviously happy.
I ask the pastor if anyone has a ministry to street people.
He looks for J but can’t find him, so we go to the back waiting for a time to leave.
The pastor comes down & points out J. He is in prayer with D and his body is shaking. N asks whether he is an epileptic, I say no, he’s just falling under the power of The Spirit. “You’ll have to come here to get drunk in the Spirit now rather than getting out of it elsewhere”, I encourage.
It looks like J will be out for a while, but within 5 minutes he is up.
J makes arrangements to pick N up on Sunday and offers counseling in the future.
We affirm her to look for a bright future and leave the dark stuff behind.
Three of us head to the stairs, P stops to talk to a friend.
N & I are in the shadows looking back at the prayer scene. She seems pretty thoughtful, so I put my arm around her to say “talk to Jesus from now on, N”.
We take her close to where she is staying tonight, give her some money (not enough to score! she thinks its not enough), P gives her a hug, “see you in a couple of weeks” then we drive home (2 hours away), smiling & buzzing in the Spirit, Jesus has used us to leak His Love to one of His.
(i will update soon.)
