Bringers and Beggars

Bringers and Beggars

I don’t know about you all, but I look at my Facebook memories every morning. Sometimes it’s a hard memory, sometimes a joyful one, sometimes funny. The biggest reason Doug and I like to post things we do or places we go together, is so we can look back at them in the following years. Memories fade, trips run together, and often details are lost. But Facebook provides a kind of digital journal of the highlights (and lowlights) of your life.

Earlier this week I read a post of mine from 13 years ago that I started mulling over to possibly use for this week’s blog: “What if every down-on-their-luck story can be traced back to a missed opportunity by someone able to help? Does that convict you? It wrecks me. ‘Lord, give me eyes to see each opportunity you put in front of me to serve others, and the willingness to do it.’” Then this morning in church, the pastor talked about “bringers and beggars,” people in your life who brought or invited you to church, and who begged God on your behalf. It resonated with me and I jotted it down in my phone, at first not realizing that it tied right into my blog idea. Despite having a prayer included, my post from 13 years ago wasn’t meant as much in a religious/evangelistic way as in a social worky, boots on the ground kind of way. Which, of course, is very much in a Jesus way. 

For those of us who grew up in the church, our parents were likely our first “bringers,” or maybe your family didn’t go to church, but you had a friend who constantly invited you to go until you finally went just to get them off your back. Whoever it was, if they cared enough to bring or invite you, they were probably begging God for you as well. Though I have no doubt there were other “beggars” in my life, one in particular came to mind first and foremost when the pastor said this today – Leslie Buettner. I didn’t know it until after the fact, but Leslie had been begging God for me. Begging for my eyes to be opened, to see Him for who He really was. Because she knew, if I did, that He was irresistible. (She was right.) Leslie had eyes to see the opportunity and the willingness to serve. And knowing her heart, I am certain I was not the only benefactor. I am now a beggar for others.

But if the religious overtone is not your thing, the sentiment is still important. “What if every down-on-their-luck story can be traced back to a missed opportunity by someone able to help?” What responsibility do we, as fellow humans, have to other fellow humans? Social work is built on the very idea of avoiding this regret, and as part of humanity, we should all have a little social worker in us. What could have happened differently in the life of the homeless guy on the street corner you saw this week that would have kept him from being on that street corner? What about the drug addict? What about the prisoner, or the runaway, or the high school dropout, or the grumpy old man down the street who is mean to everyone? Could just one person’s actions have redirected their life when they were at a crossroads, making things turn out completely different for them? What if? What if an action from you – a smile, a conversation, a friendship, a dollar, an invite, a meal – could have changed the trajectory of someone’s life? What if? Sound stupid or too simple or too little? It’s not. We are just often too busy and self-involved to notice the simple ways we can encourage, support, or even save one another. Saying that something as little as a smile or a conversation won’t matter is just justification for continuing in our self-involvement.

So be a bringer. Of hope, laughter, food, money, friendship, love, care, support. Move out of your comfort zone and don’t just do these things for friends, do them for strangers.

Be a beggar. An advocate, a prayer warrior, a friend who doesn’t leave when times get rough. Even when you don’t know what to do for them other than just stand in it with them. Stand there, begging for relief on their behalf. Fight for them.

Imagine the ways our world would be different right now if we were all bringers and beggars instead of Democrats and Republicans, or blacks and whites, or rich and poor, or us and them… What if?