Reaching Out to the Homeless
December 1st, 1887, was a dramatic day in William Booth’s life. He had been reading a letter from the leader of the new Salvation Army work in America. It explained that when a prisoner was released from San Quentin Prison, a Salvation Army officer was appointed as his probation officer. No one else wanted the job. The prisoners were often mandated to attend Salvation Army meetings for a week. The letter finished with “We see a need and we meet it.” William couldn’t get those words out of his head.
Another letter, again from America, told how Salvation Army officers in New York had found an abandoned baby dying in an empty apartment room. The officers had taken the baby in and nursed it back to health. This took William back to his own early days in Nottingham where he had seen mothers give their babies opium so they could leave them all day. The mothers had no money for child minding and needed to work to meet the rent.
Later that night while returning from a meeting, William had noticed dozens of homeless men huddled in nooks and crannies on London Bridge covered with scraps of newspapers trying to keep warm. William had believed in preaching the gospel anywhere and in any way, but he had done very little to change the appalling social conditions of those they reached out to. William diverted the horse-drawn carriage to his son, Bramwell’s home. Waking him up, William remonstrated, “We have to do something … rent a warehouse … warm it up … get some blankets …”
In the coming months the Salvation Army opened food depots, soup kitchens and hostels for the homeless across England. This became part and parcel of who they were and continues through to who they are today.
‘Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead’ (James 2:15-17)