So many dreams I've had through the years. Okay, maybe not all dreams, just ideas, and hopes, and ... well, dreams! By this point, I've let go of a lot of them, I know I can't do them all. I've had to narrow, to focus, to actually spend time and effort on what I can do, perhaps (hopefully) what I am most suited to do, and most able to do with the resources available.
Yet still, the dreams come, the ideas come. Maybe they aren't dreams of things I would carry out myself, but things I hope to see.
Recently the dreams are about the homeless, the wanderers, and the weak. There have been a bunch of 'new' homeless people in town. At least, then are new to me, the weren't there before. I wonder if folks have been kicked out of larger centers and are making their way to smaller places. One man hangs out by the closest garbage bins. He's often laughing, a strange crazy laugh.
I've had some fun times with that "crazy lady" lately--I don't want to call her that. I want to know her name, know her story. I've heard bits and pieces, and am not sure what is true. It seems...her husband was bitten by a snake and died. Her children (2 maybe) are not with her now. She says they've been taken away. I'm not sure what her problem is. She can be super annoying, talking non-stop nonsense and creating a disturbance--to what degree I don't know. I have seen her being pushed out of the police station by an angry and frustrated policeman, fighting with a shop keeper, and seen her swollen hand--a witness said another market vendor beat her. She's never been violent or dangerous with me. Once I was able to calm her down and remove her from the situation. Another time she was disturbing
my plans. It just took about half an hour of listening, crazy chatting...patience. The other day she was downright funny--I laughed out loud several times as we walked to the clinic to ask the doctor to check her hand. I don't yet know her name, she doesn't clearly tell me what it is...I want to make up a good one for her...a nickname I guess.
The last two times I saw her she talked about selling land. That's another dream I've had... I've thought of buying our next centre, or buying land and building. Several times I've thought of some poor people living in shack houses on land, and wondered--is there a way to buy from them in a way that would preserve their portion, still give them a place to live? This lady--she also just needs someone with understanding to take care of her.
Today I thought of a city for the homeless, the weak. A city, or a community...where there are things to do, responsibilities and contribution according to ability, but people to help with the needs--the bathing, the feeding, and especially the protecting.
In the past, there were dreams of a home for the elderly, homes and ways for girls to leave prostitution. Orphanage dreams--oh that was one of the earliest dreams...long left behind.
I guess I dream of a new world, a new way. I dream of people with changed lives who are ALL somehow finding ways to do these things--as they go, with the people they see, the people they know. And I dream of seeing this here, and in this generation, not just in the happy every after.
And some of it is happening--people that take others in, reach out to their neighbour's brokenness, become a place of refuge, taking their friends to the Refuge they know.
These dreams, Lord--I know they are all Your will in heaven for how things should happen on earth. What am I to do with them as they come? Just live out parts of them in small simple ways, and encourage others to do the same? Are there some I should really pursue, instigate, or somehow otherwise support in the future? (yes, the future, not now...I know...)
Lead me Lord. May all Your dreams come true. Put in my heart the dreams You want me to live and follow, and spread.
