Since moving to Orlando, I've had the opportunity to serve with a ministry called "Home Sweet Homeless". You may remember reading about my encounter with a man named Rick a few articles ago; that life-changing meeting took place with this ministry at one of their monthly potlucks. To be honest with you, I was sort of guilted into attending my first Home Sweet Homeless event. I was checking out my friend Matt Mackey at an open mic and walked into a conversation Matt was having with Mitchell. Turns out Jordan-17 and two friends, David Blackwell-19 and Ben Kuykendall-19, were organizing their first HSH event and invited Matt and I to come.

I was amazed by the response of young people who came to feed the homeless that first day. I met men and women in high school, college and a few of us in our twenties to thirties. As I talked to the people who came, I found that not all of them were Christians, just people who desired to help their fellow man. Little by little we invited the homeless we encountered to sit and join us for a meal. I can't tell you how amazing it was to see upper and middleclass young people serving the local homeless.

If you ever want to be broken, watch a 19 year-old in $150 jeans make a plate of food for a homeless man.

Over the last few months we have been to the same park twice for our potlucks and groups have made their way back to simply talk with the friends they've made. David was telling me about a man he was walking with that said, "there are places to get food, and anyone can do that. The difference is you kids spend the day with us and talk with us. That's what the adults don't get."

To be honest, that's what I didn't get. A man or woman wants food and shelter, sure, but it turns out they crave interaction even more.

I sat down recently in an interview with Jordan, David, and Ben to ask why they started this ministry.

"[We'd] never really talked to a homeless person before and wanted to hear their stories," said David. Jordan interjects, "People are walking past these people without even another thought and even worse, treating like crap people that have stories that may change their lives." "What better place than Orlando, having the 3rd largest homeless population in all of Florida?", Ben says.

In looking at these three I see the difference between them and myself: they put their passion for the homeless in this community to action and I am sitting at my computer writing about them.

I made the mistake of calling HSH a homeless ministry, and was promptly corrected, "We look at it as a ministry to upper and middle class young people as much, if not more, than to the homeless. Our desire is to ultimately become a bridge to the homeless. It is time that we went to them."

My prayer is that the story of Jordan, David and Ben, founders of HSH, will cause the rest of us to search out our passions and become active in implementing them in our society. I have no intention of you reading this and starting a homeless ministry in your community (unless that ends up being your passion). But I do desire to see you spark change in your own way and have a reaching impact that the world will notice.

For those of you that are interested in hearing more about Home Sweet Homeless, check out their Myspace by clicking here. They have high school and college campus clubs starting in local Orlando schools and will be branching out into other communities soon. Who knows, maybe you can be the catalyst for that to happen in your hometown? There are also opportunities to donate and become more involved in what HSH is doing right now.

-David Miller
NotTheAverage Ministries