Hello from OKC, what a beautiful day the Lord had blessed us with. We started our morning with a devotional from Dugan about how to connect with the least of these. The main focus on it was to make sure we are viewing these people as Jesus would view them. The devotional was a pivotal part of the morning because today is the big homeless immersion day.

After a delicious breakfast from Christy, we got ready for the day and headed out on The Vineyard Bus to downtown Oklahoma City. There we were spilt into groups and sent out to experience the life of the homeless. The first stop we came to was what a lot of us named “Tent city”. There were probably 30-40 tents lined up here. In my group, Vicki, Sum, Aiden and I got the opportunity to learn about Mark and Chirsta. Christa recently got in a house which she had been on the waitlist for eight years. While Mark is in the thick of being homeless and needing assistance. While these two were not living in the best circumstances, you could tell they had a presence about them that they wanted to get out of the homelessness. Mark is struggling with the hopelessness and we knew we needed to pray for him to restore Gods hope into his life.

As we were walking around Oklahoma City, we had a task to find a couple of different things that would help someone who is homeless get resources they need. In doing this we came across a place that helps recovering addicts and individuals with mental health issues. Here we got to talk with the project director Chris and she gave us all the information on what the center does for people. This is a faith-based organization so it was so comforting to know that the Lord we serve is the same Lord that they are serving. This organization includes a year long program that helps about 50 people at a time and then helps to reintegrate them back into the community. This was an eye opening experience because this organization just shows how to love people and love them well. While here I was reminded of what Dugan said earlier in the day about seeing people how Jesus sees them.

Once we all gathered back at the bus we headed out for Mexican food and a debrief. During this debrief we all got to talk about our experience being in Oklahoma City. We all had an encounter with the Lord in a unique way. There were so many people that we met that wanted us to pray for them. It was so heartbreaking to hear just how many of the people we encountered were feeling hopeless. I am so grateful for this team who took all of the opportunities to pray for the people who needed it the most. Once we got back to the center we were allow some time to relax or connect with the students who come here every day. Some of the team took this time to connect with the Lord, or reset, some played cards and some played outside with the kids.

In the evening, we join a local organization called “From the Ashes” there we were serving the homeless population. We served them meals, snacks, pop and waters. There we also had clothes that the people could pick out to take with them. This was a stretching time for a lot of us because we had the opportunity to pray for people and tell them about God. This time was really eye opening because there were so many people who just need someone to treat them as a human and our team was doing an outstanding job just stepping in and ministering to people and hearing there stories and praying over them. There were so many moments where you just look around and the Lord highlighted someone who just needs encouragement. We got to meet people from so many different walks of life and understand the interworking of their lives. I was extremely blessed to be able to serve this community and feel grateful that this team is working hard to keep moving the kingdom of God.

When we come back from our day, we are blessed to have time to connect with the group and debrief about the long and full day we had. We ended the night with “Happies and Crappies”—this has been a good bonding time for the team and tonight we really took the time and prayed for each other. This has been foundational in our team building, we want to be encourages to each other and that is show through our prayers together. While the day was long and hard. The hard moments from the day were lifted off our hearts by a prayer from Jeremy. When we pray for each other our spirits were lifted out love for one another.

Now we are all resting up for another packed day tomorrow. Thank you all for your prayers we are excited to see what the Lord will continue to do in the coming days.

Share