Dirty

The youth cafe started again on Friday night, it was quite quiet, the fair was also on and we only had twenty something youngsters, which was still good, and to be perfectly honest, it i nice to get back into things slowly. Also on Friday night there was a prayer meeting going on and I was a bit concerned about the two clashing. Well they did. Probably as God planned they would.

A young lad from the youth cafe, who had obviously had a few beers, stumbled into the prayer meeting, one of the guys thought he might be lost and spoke with him outside, I came to speak to him. He was adamant that he wanted to see what was going on, he wanted to go into the service. Honestly, my first thought was, no, this drunk lad should not be going in and interupting this prayer meeting. I really had to fight it. I told him of course he could go in, one of the youth workers would go in with him and explain what was going on. He went in, people came and prayed for him, he sang along to songs, he came out and had a chat with me. He said he knew he had to do something to turn his life around and he would consider coming along to another meeting. A real barrier was broken down. The young guy will no longer not know what goes on in church, people know him, the people there have an idea now of what goes on on a Friday night and the need that is there, people also have an idea of what dirty church means, I am so proud of their reaction to a drunk youth off the streets, sitting in a prayer meeting, it is the reality of this world and the church needs to be ok with the so called scum drifting in and engaging and asking and being themselves. It is where Jesus was, with the tax collectors and prostitutes, the beggars and the lepors. In the dirty places, showing love, not judging, being honest. In power.