October 29, 2003

• Still
  
  By Bob Perks
  
  You may have driven by his home a hundred times and never knew
  he lived there. No one did. In the rush of your day, you may
  have seen him walking down the street yet, wouldn't recognize
  his face. No one would.
  
  Perhaps a time or two you came face to face with him in town.
  I'm sure he said "hello," he always did. But you didn't know
  his name, so you didn't respond. Why would you?
  
  This night, he lay barely clothed in the icy cold darkness,
  well hidden beneath the bridge, his home. His bed was an old
  refrigerator box someone dumped nearby. His shoes, mismatched
  and worn out, barely covered his swollen, sock-less feet. His
  hands were wrapped in torn pieces of cloth, and his fingers
  were cut and dirty. His pants were stained and ripped, two
  sizes too big for his thin frail body.
  
  He was a broken man who cried himself to sleep each night, but
  couldn't shed a tear. In his frustration tonight, he cried out
  for help. With his hands stretched out before him, he screamed
  with all he had left in him, "God! I need you!" Then, lowering
  his hands, he frantically searched around the box next to him,
  finally finding what he wanted. He sighed, as he held his only
  life treasure close to his heart. It was a small bible given to
  him years ago. Inside the cover, barely legible, was the
  inscription, "God loves you, still!"
  
  "God!," he cried. "I am nothing! I have wasted the life you
  have given me."
  
  Lying there a few minutes, listening to the cars pass overhead,
  his tortured spirit wore him down as he reflected back on a
  lifetime of failure. Weakened now, he struggles to breathe.
  
  "God, do you still love me?" he cried. Suddenly he is shaken by
  the sound of someone nearby.
  
  "Are you alright?"
  
  "God, is that you?"
  
  "Are you alright?"
  
  He coughs and gasps for air. "God, do you still love me?" he
  asks again.
  
  Then a bright light appears at the open end of his make-shift
  home. Blinking, struggling to focus, he sees a silhouette of
  a man against the light.
  
  "God, do you still love me?" he whispers now.
  
  "Yes, God loves you, be still." the stranger replied.
  
  He is relieved. "Still" he whispers.
  
  Then, the man no one saw, the face no one recognized, the man
  without a name, died in a home no one knew about. "Still!" he
  sighed with one final breath.
  
  Yes, God loved him..."Still!"
  
  No matter the condition of your life, the circumstances you
  find yourself in right now, be assured..."God loves you, still!"

  
  

  
  

  ---

  What a sad story do you not agree?  Yes, still, God loves YOU!  

  • 11:20 pm
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