As a Body

Today we worshiped alongside some folks from Generation City: Bread of Life in Oceanside; a ministry branching from Generation City Church, holding Sunday services in the Bread of Life Homeless Shelter.

Getting there was tricky.

We pulled into the parking lot with plenty of time to spare. But with it not being a 'traditional' church setting, combined with the fact that the building was divided into many suites, we were unsure of where to go. We heard worship music coming from one of the several opened doors and saw some 'churchy' looking people entering, so we headed in through that door.

We were greeted so warmly and with such genuineness that it was like nothing we'd ever experienced before. Unfortunately, it didn't take us long to realize it wasn't the church we were trying to find.

Feeling awful about leaving before the service after such a sweet and unexpected welcome, we did our best to slip out the door unnoticed so we could explore further down the strip to find the church we were looking for.

And there he was, squatting down by a wheelchair-bound homeless man and chatting away charismatically. It was Glenn. Glenn is a new friend who I met at work and he is right in the center of some big things that God is doing.  I told Glenn I'd like to visit the Sunday service he helped orchestrate every week and he jotted down the information for me.

So, here I was.

Glenn greeted me with a huge smile. He excitedly shook my hand and jokingly said, "People in California always say they'll come see you or do something for you, but they never do! That's how I know you're not really from here!"

And after relaying to him our earlier experience of entering the wrong place, we learned that it was actually a Filipino church. "Hm, that explains a few things!"

Glenn led worship on a guitar with a single amp, and another man banged around on a beat-box. A homeless man played a rusty old harmonica he brought a long, while another man sporadically shook a plastic, yellow maraca. The woman sitting behind us sang loudly to her own melody and lyrics. She smelled like beer and body odor. She had a large opened wound by her right eye from a fight she had been in just a couple days earlier.

Then the message began. We were in Ephesians chapter 2. The pastor was frequently interrupted by questions, comments, and a few random and unrelated prayer requests. (Most questions were unrelated to the lesson as well.)

It was completely chaotic. And uncomfortable.
Yet so beautiful.

Homeless. Middle-class. Black. White. Hispanic. Able-bodied. Disabled.
People with such different lives. People from different worlds.

And they were all gathered together.
It functioned. In a dysfunctional way.

But it functioned. As a body.
And God was glorified.