And Whatever You Did For the Least of These

I went downtown Chicago today with the Sunday Snacks program at school.  This is a year round ministry to provide lunches to the homeless people living on the streets of Chicago!  Whom ever is available meets after lunch every Sunday and to pack up brown lunch bags with food.  On this particular day we packed up applesauce, chips, and a sandwich in the bags.  Then we put the lunches in a backpack along with water bottles.  We rode in vans to the heart of the city, the tall building looming over us the closer we got.  The leaders (older students who run the program) divided the kids into groups.  Each group goes down a different street in Chicago with lunches.  I was in a group with three other kids, and we had six lunches in our pack.  We walked down one street and handed out a lunch to each homeless person we met.  I was told that most of them are Christians!  The leaders know all the homeless people by name and they know what is going on in their lives.  It was really cool to see our leader greet each man or woman by name and then ask them what was new in their life.  Our leader then asked the person if they had any prayer requests so that we could pray with them.  All four of us stood in a circle, held hands, and prayed for the person's needs.  It was very awkward at first to be standing in the middle of the busy sidewalks downtown, praying over the homeless, as everyone else went past lost in their own lives.  Once I got used to it, I felt the power of  the prayer.  When were done handing out all of our lunches and conversing with the each person we walked back to the vans to wait for the other groups to finish.  On the ride back home we discussed what happened and the specific prayer needs of the people.  God is at work among these people!  It was an awesome experience- something I hope to continue being a part of.  I leaned that these people may be in a tough spot at this point in their life, but they are all hopeful that their future will be brighter.  The Lord says, "I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future!" Jeremiah 29:11