We heard about the “Operation Care Dallas” ministry on
the radio station KCBI on Tuesday. My wife was crying when she called me and
told me of how they needed volunteers to wash the feet of the homeless and that
she wanted to be involved with that. Naturally, loving my wife’s heart of
compassion for people, I could not say no. I got online and found all the
information I could and I signed us up as “Foot Washers.”
No sooner than the commitment was made, things began to get
difficult. First, I began thinking about the difficulty of even looking at
another person’s dirty feet; this gave me guilt for my lack of compassion and
faith. My wife was pulled into the middle of an emotional argument at the school
where she works, between another teacher and the principal. Against my wife’s
opposition, she was appointed to the position of leadership the other teacher
held, which only caused more tension. The weather turned stormy, and we were
getting no rest at night as our tension began to rise over various circumstances
on many sides.
We had little money in the bank and no gas in either
vehicle, and I began to wonder if we were going to be able to keep our
commitment. Friday afternoon, I prayed in my heart as I was driving around in
the rain and cold doing some things I had promised my brother I would do for
him. Through my diligence to keep that small promise to help ease my brother’s
tension, the Lord made me realize that He is the one who appointed us to this
and that He is the one who would see it through. So I girded up the loins of my
faith and placed my trust solely in the Lord Jesus, believing he would provide
what we needed to do the job he had set before us. We were not disappointed.
Friday night arrived finally, and somehow we had the house
to ourselves as the children went to different places since we had to get up
Saturday at five A.M. to get to Dallas by eight A.M. I had been praying pretty
constantly in my heart that the Lord would prepare us and make us able to do the
work he set before us. Friday night we slept like babies, even though we were
awakened by loud thunder and violent rain, we were up on time and fully
refreshed. The best we had slept all week. Also that evening, the Lord began to
fill my heart with scripture and the desire to give of myself unlike ever
before. Upon wakening, the one verse going through my mind over and over was the
words of Peter from the book of Acts, “Money have I none but what I have I
give you. I give you Jesus Christ.”
We prayed before we left the house and immediately our hearts were filled with joy and a desire to go as the Lord commanded. A song derived from a Psalm of David began to go through my mind and gave me joy, “You shall go out with joy and be led forth with peace, the mountains and the hills will break before you, there will be shouts of joy and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.” I thought of the trees and it occurred to me how windy it was supposed to be that day, truly the trees were clapping their hands! The traffic was not bad at all, though we missed our exit and came in the long way around, got lost on the mix master and ended up in downtown Dallas trying to find the convention center. My wife was shaking due to a near miss on the freeway from some lunatic driver who cut us off. But we arrived at the convention center with fifteen minutes to spare and had no problem finding parking.