Traci’s Mission Trip Moment

Last week Traci took her church on their 5th multi-generational trip to Cheyenne River Reservation. Here is a story of a mission trip moment Traci experienced while on the trip.

 

Last week in Cheyenne River my group was working on Mervin’s home. Mervin is what some might call a “street person” who walks the streets all day and just has a shelter of a home. His trailer was just that – no running water or electricity and very rundown, but that doesn’t even describe it. We were there to paint it, clean up the trash, fix windows (which were only plastic sheets) and put some kind of skirting on it. He had two old mattresses and a torn sleeping bag outside. When we met him at lunch he said that it was too hot inside the trailer, so in summer he slept outside on the mattresses… the ones we had just thrown on the trash pile. So, we pulled the mattresses out again.

 

When Mervin walked up to his house that day he had tears in his eyes as he said, “I didn’t even recognize my home. Thank you.”

 

Painting was done, so the next day half of my group went to the high school to put together lockers. Yuck! It was a tedious job that we had to figure out on our own, but one of our youth stepped in and figured it out! Beautiful!

 

We thought our task that day was to assemble lockers, but it was really to bless Mervin, because as we were in the bus garage assembling the lockers I looked up and saw three mattresses just lying there. When Harvey, the guy who worked at bus garage, came back I asked him what they were for. He had no idea and said they had been there for years. I asked him if we could have one for Mervin, and he said absolutely then he looked at all three to find the best one for Mervin.

 

 

We had to put together those pain-staking lockers so that we could bless Mervin with a new bed. Beautiful. Then we got him a new sleeping bag from YouthWorks donations. I saw Mervin the next day at the Mustard Seed and, again, tears in his eyes. “Thank you for my new bed,” he said.

 

Here was a “street person.” Most in our town back here would not associate with someone like him. (Man, was I convicted!) But all throughout the week people – people who had jobs and lived in homes that had running water/electricity, windows, etc. – weren’t trying to make him like them. They just loved him as he was. His community would come up to us to thank us for what we did for Mervin’s home – restored some dignity to his home and him. We found out Mervin’s wife died several years ago, and we’d just say he is stuck in that grief.

 

Whatever or wherever he is, I praise God that he has a community around him that cares for him and loves him just as he is. I pray for that kind of community for us all.

 

Jesus’ Upside-Down Kingdom: Please come.