I had only been interning at the downtown Baltimore church for a week.  Everything was new and exciting.  I was falling in love with the city: the mass amounts of people, the busyness, the feel of being part of a really cool community, the constant motion of everything…it was intoxicating; but scary as well.

I wasn’t used to walking everywhere I went; and thus I wasn’t used to encountering so many homeless addicts asking for money or laying on the bus stop benches half conscious.  I wasn’t used to having sketchy looking people that could easily crush me walk so close behind me.  I wasn’t used to being surrounded by so many strangers all the time.

People kept telling me how dangerous the city was: how many murders there had been already that year, how often muggings occurred, and how I had to be really careful.   I was a strange mix of passion and caution.  Like a kindergartener on his first day of school, I was wide eyed with the newness of it all, but jumpy, always glancing over my shoulder.

My wife and son were still living in Texas since she was teaching and had four weeks left in the school year before she could join me.  This meant I had nothing to do but work.  That night I had a meeting with two brilliant guys (Ben and Tracy) about small groups from 9:00 pm to midnight at a local coffee house/bar.  After the meeting I walked five blocks back the office, it was a Saturday night which meant that there were people everywhere.  I prayed the whole way home: I was so thankful for everything and was so humbled by how God was using me.

When I got back to my office I took out the ratty looking three ring binder I took notes in and began typing out the notes of the meeting.  At one point I paused and made a pot of coffee.  I had never drank coffee before that week, but I was already an addict.  That had to have been pot five or six for me that day.  The caffeine only added to my jumpiness.  Everything startled me.

So there I was… 2:00 AM.  I had been completely alone in the office for hours:  just me, my coffee, my notes, and my computer when suddenly I heard the “beep-beep” that indicates someone was coming in the front door.  My mind began racing.  ”Did I forget to close it!  I thought it was suppose to lock behind me!  What in the hell am I doing here at 2:00 AM?  Am I about to be shot?  Am I going to die?!?”

I could see the headlines in my mind, “Young 20 Something Moron Killed in His Office in the City at 2:00 AM.  What was He Thinking?”

I knew it wasn’t another staff member because I could hear the person walking around down stairs, bumping into things, struggling to find light switches.  Like any brave pastor full of faith that God would protect me,  I slowly rose from my chair, quietly as I could I closed the door to my office, turned off my lights and computer monitor, and crouched down in my seat hoping I wouldn’t be noticed by the intruder.  “Lord, make him go away,” was all I could manage to pray.

You know how when your really afraid everything seems to move in slow motion?  I felt as though there was a five minute gaps in between his strides up the stairs.  “Clump…clump…clump…”  Then I heard the door knob to the outer office turn and the lights came on.

“Is anybody here?” a deep male voice said.  I almost wet myself.  I sunk deeper into my chair.

He tried the other office doors only to find them locked.  Then he noticed the red light on the half drank pot of coffee indicating that it was still warm, and he began to pour himself a cup.  I could hear him shaking and then tearing open sugar packets.

I thought to myself, “This is stupid.  My door is the only one left.  He is going to try it any minute.  I might as well face him standing up and not cowering in a chair.”

So with as much energy as I could muster, pretending like it was normal that someone would be sitting in his office in complete darkness at 2am, I flipped my light on and burst from my office with a big smile on my face.

“Hey how are ya?  How can I help ya?” I said with way to much enthusiasm.  Now he was the one that was petrified.

He spilled a little of his coffee on the floor and I jumped into action grabbing paper towels to clean it up.

He was a thin African American man who looked to be in his mid-thirties.  His head was shaved and he was wearing a dirt stained wife beater and old jeans; and his left arm was hanging in a loose sling that clearly had not been applied by a doctor.

After I rose from blotting up the coffee drips, we stood there and stared at each other for a moment.  Not knowing what else to do, I invited him to sit down at the conference table with me.  We sat for a moment, just looking at each other, and then he launched into his story.

He explained that he had been working in a warehouse, but had broken his arm last week and was laid off until it healed.  With desperation he said that  he had been going from church to church all day no one would help him.  He was just looking for some money to buy food for his wife and five kids.  They had gone to bed without dinner and he didn’t want them to wake up and not have breakfast.  “Do you have anything?  Even just five dollars?” he pleaded.

I looked at his arm hanging comfortably slack in the sling – clearly not broken.  I looked at his left hand – no wedding band.  His brow was wet with sweat; and even though the office was warm, he was shivering.  He couldn’t seem to keep still.  He shifted back and forth in his chair and his hands shook a little.  I didn’t buy his story for a second.  I was left with the choice of insinuating that he was a liar and sending him away with nothing, or defying all logic and taking him at his word.

I looked him in the eyes for a moment, stood up, walked to my office, grabbed my keys and my wallet, and said, “Let’s go.”

He looked incredibly confused.  “No pastor.  You can just give me the money.  I don’t want to put you out or nothin.”

“Your kids need food right?” I said as I headed down the stairs.

“Ummm…yeah.  But you ain’t got to come with me.”  he replied nervously.

“Nope.  Your kids need food.  Let’s get your kids food.”  I said with determination.

Conversation during the drive to the 24 hour Wal-Mart was strained.  I found out where he grew up, where he went to school, how old he was.  I refused to ask about his kids, wife, or broken arm.

He walked awkwardly behind me as I loaded up the shopping cart with different types of cereal, four gallons of milk, snacks, frozen dinners, what ever was on the shelves that I thought a family of seven might need to make it through a few weeks with no income.   The bill came to almost two-hundred and fifty bucks.

We loaded everything into my car and started driving.  He said at one point he didn’t know how he was going to carry all this home from my church so I replied, “Oh we’re not going to the church.  I’m going to give ya a ride home.  Just tell me when I need to turn.”

We weaved through Baltimore mostly in silence.  I would ask a questions about his life and he would answer with a single word delivered in a tone of mixed confusion and frustration.

“How old are your kids?”

“Um.  5, 7, 9, and 10.”

“How old is the fifth one?”

“Oh, yeah, she’s 11.”

“How long have you been married?”

“A while.”

“Where did you meet?”

“You know. We knew each other from around.”

“How long have you worked at the warehouse?”

“I don’t know.  A little while.”

Finally he had me stop at a house that looked abandoned.  Next door was a 24 hour liquor store.  I started to get out of the car to help him get the groceries inside but he stopped me and said, “I got it.  Everyone is asleep.  Don’t want to wake them up you know.”

So I popped the trunk for him and watched in the rear view mirror as he loaded both arms down with the food.  The sling hung around his shoulder like a purse.  He climbed the three steps to the house’s front door, pushed it open, and put the bags inside.  He looked back and said to me, “Thanks a lot.”  Then the door closed.

At this point it was a little past 3am so I drove back to the office and crashed on a couch in the youth room.

I would like to say that the guy came to church the next Sunday, gave his life to Jesus, became a member, and is now one of my best buds… but I never saw him again.

What would YOU have done?