Apologetics

Homelessness has been equated with hopelessness for some. But others see hope for the homeless.  

Bishop Jack Wisor, who has been running a homeless ministry for more than 17 years said "homelessness is cruel and can only be cured by the love of Christ." 

As I've been saying on my blogs, as an unofficial advocate for the homeless in Bucks County, PA, the church, not the government, is the institution that can best help the homeless. Across the river in Burlington Township, New Jersey, at a meeting to discuss the plan to provide housing for the homeless, Pastor Byron Hammond said that the church can best help the homeless.  

Awhile back, a taxpayer funded "recovery coach", who, before his program was defunded, rounded up homeless people to shanghai them to bring them aboard the local mental health clinic. He told me he doesn't believe in "housing first" and that homeless people need to get straight before getting housing.  

I went to the clinic the recovery coach was hustling, but from a referral from the Salvation Army. After getting me on the right track, the Army palmed me off to the Penndel Mental Health Center where they loaded me with psychotropic drugs to treat my anxiety. It made me worse. My hand kept shaking violently. The center and someone at the Salvation Army who was in the psychobabble business kept telling me there's a break in period. After a few months, I stopped taking Paxil.   

When I first met a shrink from Penndel Mental Health at the Salvation Army, he asked if I would be willing to take medication.  

After the therapist at the center learned I had stopped taking the "meds", he stated that I cannot continue therapy unless I stay on drugs. Bye! I left the clinic. The therapy entailed cognitive behavior, which is just a model, no content on what to do, where you get an idea, act on it, analyze the outcomes, then rethink what you are going to do. 

Bishop Wisor indicted modern psychiatry:"The utter destruction being waged on so many people today by psychiatry and the three billion dollar psychotropic drug industry.  Medicine, when used to truly improve the quality of a person’s life, is a gift from God, Bishop Wisor will tell you.  But when drugs turn you into someone you do not recognize – someone who is not you – that is just evil and robs someone of their ability to seek their God and become the person God created them to be."  

-Just For Jesus Challenge Outreach Ministry website. 

After I left the clinic, I substituted dark chocolate and Kava tea for that psychotropic drug. My hands stopped shaking. I continued to pray, read the Bible, worship, and get informal counsel from fellow Christians. People soon noticed my demeanor, behavior improved and continued to improve. 

In my associations with the homeless in Bucks County, I noticed that people who had gone to the de facto official homeless mental health center had gotten worse over time. They'd get angry more easily and often, had a more negative outlook on life, and seemed to lack ambition. A source told me that after Penndel Mental Health Center is done with their clients, they dump them near the homeless shelter, which has a month's long waiting list, and they end up wandering the woods like zombies. 

The homeless who took the route of the church fared much better. One homeless friend with substance abuse problems went through a twelve steps program and worked temp jobs. He told me that he didn't want to be made too comfortable in his situation so he would have incentive to get out of it.  He worked sporadically, and ran low on cash, so much so that he didn't have the money to renew his state ID, which was required for a job he was offered. He told me he trusted God in this matter. Somehow he managed to get the ID and is now working a steady job a tech school prepared him for. As I told him, it's good that he didn't revert to his old habits in this trying time. 

He said he attends church regularly. 

The love of Christ and by submitting to Him and following his ways is the path to overcome homelessness. And other problems. 

"I will lift up my eyes to the hills- 

Where does my help come from? 

My help comes from the Lord, 

The Maker of heaven and earth. 

He will not let your foot slip- He who 

Watches over you will neither slumber nor sleep. 

The Lord watches over you – the Lord 

Is your shade at your right hand; the 

Sun will not harm you by day, nor the 

Moon by night. 

The Lord will keep you from all harm 

The Lord will watch over your coming 

And going both now and forevermore" 

-Psalm 121