The Lord Said Go North 5

Back at the flat on Saturday evening, Matthew put all the sausages and burgers under the huge grill in the electric cooker. One of the guests arrived. He was a man of about 20 in rather worn out clothes.
"Hello. I'm John."
"Hello," said Gary.
"Are you cooking the food? Oh, it'll be good to have a burger and some sausages. I haven't had a good feed for ages. I can hardly pay the bills. I'm unemployed."
"Do you live on beans on toast?" asked Gary.
"Beans on toast would be a luxury. Beans with pasta more like and kidney beans because they're cheaper than ordinary beans."
"Can't you afford a cheap loaf of bread?"
"Afford it, yes, but I have to get the bus to town, and I can only afford that once a week. So I have cheese sandwiches two days a week and the rest of the time I live on pasta and kidney beans."
"Do you live in a hotel room?"
"A hotel room would be a luxury. At least that would be warm. My flat is cold and damp. If you want to find a landlord that accepts DSS, go to a little corner shop on a rough housing estate and look at the hand written adverts on the notice board. They don't have to meet building regulations. Just rent an old taxi office on the outskirts of town that somebody allegedly converted into a flat by putting a bed, an electric heater, a toaster, a kettle and a microwave oven into one of the rooms. Then, of course, it's got a coin operated meter, so the electricity costs even more money." Another man arrived. He was older than John.
"Hi. I'm Elliott," he said. "I'm homeless."
"Hi Elliott," said Matthew. "I've done my homework, I want to help people like you. I know where the local branch of Shelter is. We'll go there together on Monday morning."
"Not Shelter," said Elliott. "They put me in that awful hostel."
"Beggars can't be choosers."
"Yes they can."
"Elliott, you should look at it this way. You've only got to live in that hostel for a year and then you'll have a council flat."
"For a year? I don't think I'd survive a year with that woman who was in the hostel."
"Can't you live with your parents?"
"I can't stand living with my Dad. He talks to himself."
"Well, I don't know what your dad or that woman in the hostel are like but it must be infinitely better than living in a sleeping bag in a freezing cold subway."
"I haven't got a sleeping bag anymore. It was stolen." Matthew decided that the sausages were ready.
"Would anyone like a sausage?"
"Oh, yes please," said John, grabbing one of the sliced bread buns Matthew had laid on the table. Matthew put a sausage into it. John took a bite.
"Yuck! This sausage is only cooked on one side."
"I'm sorry," said Matthew. "I haven't used a grill before. I hardly ever cook." John handed the sausage back to Matthew.
"Just turn them over and do them on the other side," said Gary. Matthew turned over the sausages and burgers and now made sure they were cooked on both sides. Barnabas arrived.
"Oh no, I've had dinner," said Barnabas. "I didn't realise that we were having food."
"Thank you Barnabas. That's very encouraging," said Matthew. "Just have a sausage sandwich." He placed a sausage in a bun and handed it to Barnabas. The Stain family arrived. David and Suzie arrived with their children.
"Oh, you're having a barbecue? Great," said Nicky, in a dark brown voice, removing a red and white ladies'glove from what was obviously a very masculine hand.
"Do you have a burger or a sausage?" asked Matthew. Sarah laughed. Matthew was suddenly shocked by the double meaning of his words.
"A sausage for now," said Nicky, "and maybe a burger later on." Kevin and Jenny arrived with Rachel. Matthew looked at Gary with an expression on his face as if he had just won the European lottery after a rollover week.
"Pastor Matthew at last," he said. "I've got twelve people in my group. When we go to Manchester Praise Day we'll have to hire a minibus. Gary, one day you and me are going to stand on that stage, at a big national church event, and tell them how it's done."
"Matthew, it isn't possible for us to tell them how anything's done. It's God who does it. And the only thing you have done is bring together one person who is homeless, another who lives in a slum and is starving, a local Christian who mistakenly thinks he has the gift of encouragement and a family who have been in half a dozen churches and who don't like any of them. Accepting that these are all individual people who are loved by God and have a place in the church, they are low hanging fruit."
"So I'm not the most gifted evangelist in the world ever?"
"Definitely not."

Pastor Boris stood on the stage at Manchester Praise Day and began to preach.
"There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of money rather than lovers of God. They will have a form of godliness and deny the power thereof. The devil has produced a counterfeit church. A church that loves money. A church that has no power. If I was going to make a forrged £20 note l'd have to make it a lot like the real thing. The church in this country might look real but it is a counterfeit. Jesus said, 'Do not store up for yourselves treasures on Earth, where thieves break in and steal, where moth and rust destroy.' I dare not ignore that. The majority of Christians ignore it. I dare not ignore it. It is an apostolic divine command. I dare not make it optional. I dare not say, 'I'll have a think about that and see how much it applies to me.' Those who think it is optional will bring themselves under terrible divine judgment. Jesus said do not store up treasures on Earth. How much money do you have in your savings account? How much money do you put into your pension? You are a counterfeit Christian. The Bible says that no one considered their possessions their own but that they had all things in common. God wants you to live in community. What's your excuse? 'I want to go to university. I don't want to be a domestic sister all my life. I think a woman should have a career.' Community is the most exciting thing that has happened in this world for a thousand years and young people are turning it down because they want a decent job. They just don't see it. They just don't see it. Will you come and join your brothers and sisters living in community or will you hoard?"
"Look at all the people here today," Matthew said to Barnabas. "Manchester City Hall is packed full. There's a man with crutches sitting on the stairs."
"We'll see how many people here have a genuine call to live in community and how many of them come back next year. The Lord gave me a terrible vision about the Stain family. They go to all sorts of different churches and they never get very deep and when they leave, they leave a stain, just like the stain that I have on my jacket where I spilt some coffee."
"Thank you Barnabas. That's very encouraging." 

Matthew anxiously walked around, searching through the crowd for Sarah Stain. Eventually he found her.
"Hello Sarah."
"Hello Matthew."
"Sarah, I'm going to make a vow of celibacy tonight and I can't make it until I have discussed something with you."
"What do you want to discuss?"
"Sarah, I need to know if you feel the same way about me as I feel about you."
"What way is that?"
"Sarah, you're the kindest person I've ever met, I'm madly in love with you and I want to marry you."
"Oh my God."
"Sorry. Have I offended you?"
"No. Not at all. It's just that I rarely meet a man who is madly in love with me and wants to marry me. It doesn't happen every day."
"Sarah, I am facing a huge dilemma. Should I make a vow of celibacy tonight or should I get married to my sweet little sister Sarah?"
"I thought you were celibate."
"I have never made a public lifelong vow of celibacy."
"What do you expect me to do about it?"
"Sarah, could you please simply inform me of how you feel about me."
"Matthew, I'm not in love with you and I don't want to marry you. You're actually twice my age but I'm 28 so I'm old enough to marry you if I really wanted to. I actually quite like you, you're certainly not unattractive, and you're actually very friendly but for some reason fireworks don't explode in the sky every time I think about you. I do not have the same feelings for you that you have about me."
"In that case I will make a vow of celibacy tonight."
"Matthew, are you sure it works like that? I can't promise I'm the only woman who will ever make you feel that way."
"You are not the only woman who will ever make me feel that way. There have been some half a dozen women in the past who made me feel that way."
"Are you sure you should do this?"
"The Lord said I should love them all as much as each other."
"Matthew, I respect you if you want to make a vow of celibacy but I think that that is stark staring mad."
"I shouldn't have told you all that. I should have asked you out on a date. Then I would know if you really liked me."
"And deceive me? What if I had said yes? Waste 7 years of my life and then you tell me, 'Oh, the Lord is calling me to a life of celibacy. I'm never going to marry you at all.' No Matthew, you were better to have said what you said."

Later that evening Pastor Boris stood on the stage and said, "I want all the people in this church to be either married or celibate. The apostle Paul said, 'To the unmarried I say this. It is good for them to stay unmarried but if they can not control themselves, they ought to marry. It is better to be married than to burn. To the virgins, I say this. Because of the present crisis it is better to stay as you are. If you are married, do not seek a divorce. If you are single, do not look for a wife.' If you're not convinced that God wants you to marry anyone in particular, if you're not burning with sexual desires that you can't control, God wants to have your single minded devotion to him. Be happy. You're heart belongs to him alone. And yes, in this church, when we renounce marriage for the Kingdom of Heaven, we do it publicly, when we renounce marriage for the Kingdom of Heaven, we do it for life. Come down to the front if you want to be celibate." Matthew walked down to the front of the hall. So did Sarah Stain.