Posted 462 days ago

"Ronnie" Kisses Me

by Rick Reynolds, Operation Nightwatch

"Ronnie" was about the homeliest, smelliest, loudest homeless guy at Nightwatch in our Shelter Dispatch Program. Every night he'd come in, juiced up and mouthing off. The shelters wouldn't take him from us anymore because of his wild behavior. He seemed incapable of controlling himself. I'm sure he was used to having people yell at him daily, so I started whispering.

"Ronnie, you can't talk that way here," I would tell him, and he would whisper back, "Okay!"

One memorable night we had conned some new shelter worker into taking Ronnie off our hands. He was standing in the middle of a room full of homeless guys with his pass into a shelter, and a big crooked grin on his face.

"Pastor Rick, ain't I beautiful?" he asked me.

I realized that every person in that room was waiting to see if I was going to lie to them.

"Sure Ronnie, you're beautiful." Yeah, he's in the image of God, right?

"Then hug me."

I recoiled inwardly, not wanting to get close to this smelly guy, and I tried to get next to him to give him one of those friendly used-car-salesman hugs around one shoulder, but he turned toward me and threw his arms around me in a huge bear hug, his 6'2" frame bending down over me, his rough cheek pressed against mine, the smell of cheap booze, smoke, and BO wafting over me.

Then he kissed me on the cheek and went off into the night. It was a God moment, until a little nagging voice asked me a question: "Who was the ugly one in that situation?" I realized that I had wanted to keep Ronnie at arm’s-length, keep him away from me. He, on the other hand, threw his arms around me with glorious exuberant joy. I was the one who was being ugly.

Help me love everyone with Your uninhibited joy!

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