Hobo Supper

You Need to Move On

As a Director of Missions, I get invited to numerous events.  Attending events creates a bond between church laity and a director of mission.  The continuity of a director of missions and the churches he serves comes from the Director to Laity relationship.  Some think that it is the Pastor to DOM but pastors transition to other churches.  The laity was at the church before the pastor and will be there long after he is gone.

Sometimes churches become rooted in the local church being their church, not the bride of Christ.  Laity can get the attitude of “Our Four and No More.”  I fear this trend.  Churches that do not birth new members are destined to die.  The church will continue until the Lord returns.  I must imagine that some churches will continue to meet with their four even when the church is raptured.  The attitude of the church being a closed event prevails.

I experienced this by invitation to a “Hobo Supper” church event.  One of the churches I served had an annual Hobo Supper.  This hobo supper started an iron pot cooking with a little water and meat.  Everyone brings an item from the pantry to add to the pot making a stew.  It is delicious.  The first year I attended I won best costume just wearing my everyday works clothes.  After that I will dress like a poor hobo.

One year I decided to fool the church folks.  I got an old white dress shirt that yellowed with age, put  it on by buttoning it wrong, and ripped it by stretching it.  I took an old pair of pants and cut one leg shorter than the other and tied the pants around my waist with an old rope.  I wore two different tennis shoes as well as two different socks.  I got an old had that was frayed and a broken pair of sunglasses.

I wore a pair of realistic “bubba teeth”, put smut on my face, dirt under my fingernails, and dog poop on my shoes.  I found a discarded beer can and sprinkled the remaining contents on as perfume.  I hadn’t shaved for a few days.  I had gout and walked with a limp using the staff.

Since it was a hobo supper, I took a staff and tied two canned vegetables in a red bandana on the end.  I had my son drop me at the entrance of the supper.  To make it realistic, my son acted as though he had picked me up hitchhiking and told me that was as far as he could take me, and I told him thanks and that he was a fine young man.

As I stood on the shoulder of a US Highway, drivers would move to the other side of the road to avoid me.  I stuck out my thumb to see if I could get someone to stop.  I was unsuccessful.  Several women waved and smiled as they turned to enter the hobo supper which was down a drive behind some woods.

Finally, a deacon and his wife from the church stopped as they entered the drive.  He lowered the window of the passenger side just enough to talk.  He asked me what I wanted.  I told him that I had been in town looking for food when a young man in a red jeep told me of a hobo supper.  He said I did not look to hungry.  I am a big man.  I told him not to look at my appearance and that just because I had a large stomach did not mean that I was not hungry.  He told me that I needed to move on down the road and I was not invited to the hobo supper.  He rolled up his window and continued down the drive to the supper.  Ironically, I exercised with this deacon at the local gym every morning.

Several passersby told the host that there was a bum at the driveway entrance.  She told them that it was probably me having fun.  The deacon told her that it was not me.

Another man I knew stopped and verbatim did as the deacon did.  He was not as hospitable as the deacon and told me there was no hobo supper.  I told him that I knew I was close and that I could smell the smoke and the stew cooking.  He wanted to know how I learned of the supper.  I told him a fine Christian man told me and even brought me to where someone could direct me.  He rudely said I needed to move on down the road.

After a short I while I hobbled down to the gathering.  When the host saw me, she said that is not Bobby Hopper.  Everyone shunned me.  I told them that they needed to remember the Scripture how men and women entertained Angels unaware.  I did jokingly but was serious about how they treated a stranger.

I took out my bubba teeth and removed my hat and sunglasses to reveal who I was.  They were shocked and said that if they knew it was me they would picked me up, especially my deacon friend.  I told him that it should not matter and that as a deacon he should have acted differently.

This is one of the reasons for starting God’s Front Porch.  Many of us do not feel welcome when attending church.  It may be the way we dress or smell.  It may be that we suffer from divorce or spousal abandonment.  We may have a problem with addiction, be homeless, mentally, or physically challenged, or jobless.

I know from conversations with believers that many are disgruntled with church but not with God.  Two or three of my former church members and friends have told me that one more episode at church and they will stay home, help the needy, and worship the Lord there.

The church that does not evangelize dies.  I recall that the Scriptures in the Holy Bible reveal that the church had the concept of our four and no more with all its rules and regulations and people who needed God were ignored and that is why Jesus came to save.