My husband and I live in Kenora, Ontario, Canada and have a street-front ministry to people who are homeless and drug addicted. We started our church in our home in 1999, and have quietly cared for these marginalized people ever since. We belong to the Pentecostal Church of God from Cleveland TN, and my husband is an ordained minister with them.
During this COVID-19 virus, all the homeless street people must roam the streets until the government supported shelter opens at 9:00 PM. Through wind, rain, and cold temperatures they must huddle outside and endure.
Finally my husband could take no more. In Christian love, he brought the people inside to sit and watch a movie in the warmth of our church. We have been feeding eighty people every night since August 15th, and the street people know my husband very well. In fact, police, the mayor, city council members, other churches, millionaires, as well as the street people all tell us, “there is absolutely no one else like you, Pastor Frank”!
Last night, March 24, 2020 it was cold and rainy outside. We couldn’t let the people wander around in the rain and cold for another night, because we have watched them decline in health for the last six months of being outside, so we let them come in. We had worship music on, but that didn’t reach them, they just shuffled around aimlessly.
These people are caught p in drug dealing, prostitution, and gang life. They are hurt people with a hard shell. They love my husband and I for how we have sacrificed for them, and they know we have and tell us they know, but for the most part they are closed up.
But last night, Frank was looking for some YouTube video to reach them. We stumbled upon your (Nick’s) preaching message in San Diego I think, where you said you were taking a leap of faith to call out the drug dealers to come to the front of the church and get saved.
All of a sudden, our people stopped their aimless wandering, came and sat down rooted to the screen watching you. They heard every word you said, and when Frank asked them to make a commitment to Jesus like you were doing on the screen, SEVEN people all stood up. All gang members.
The first thing two of them said they would do (after the crying and hugging finished) was clean up our bathrooms (where they had taken their drugs thinking we didn’t know) and behind our church, which is a drug den that we constantly have to clean out and monitor.
A few years ago, one of the leaders of our church headquarters in Cleveland, TN came to our Jubilee at our Church and said, “If anyone goes to hell in Kenora, they will have to do it crawling over your church. Because your church stands directly in their way”
Thank you for obeying that “nudge” in San Diego that night and bringing seven more Canadian souls into the Kingdom.
Sincerely
Lynn Kowal