Hungry

I sat next to the man and listened. He was emaciated, lying on a hospital bed. His eyes sunken but intense. He spoke urgently, telling me his story.

It was a jumble. But some things stood out. He had been robbed. He was confused and couldn't remember things clearly. He had met many people on his wanderings - some good - others who had taken advantage of him. Somewhere along the line Prakash and Vinod found him. Did he first meet Vinod in Goa? Was it here in Mumbai?

We will call the man Bill. Bill is from Canada. He almost died on the streets of Mumbai.

At the end of November we had organised a 'Day of Service' in which young people from local churches met families that we are working with and spent the day with them. One of the churches, which meets in South Mumbai, sent 12 young adults to this programme. A number of these young men were the ones who saved Bill. Literally.

Bill has almost starved to death. He suffers from mental confusion. His story is one where loneliness and success cross paths, with multiple side alleys of alcohol, women and drugs. Its also a story of a man very hungry. Hungry for love and acceptance.

Bill is by profession a dentist. A man who had the money flowing in - and who lived the life of the yacht, house by the lake, parties on him etc. He also is a man with deep rifts with his parents - a rejection of his father and mother - and a desire to find himself. Finding no way out in his town of 30,000 - and having already been admitted once with an overdose, Bill decided that India would give him the truth.

The story gets even more hazy here, but it seems that over the past months, Bill has been wandering a lonely path, observing, thinking and gradually losing control.

Talking to him, he was most lucid about his Canadian past - and his fear and loathing of going back. How starved for love this man is.

Bill has tried everything possible to live a good life, to not harm anyone, to be kind and benevolent. And yet things were clearly spinning way out of control in his own country - and he has been blended here.

I found myself going back to what Jesus said: "Come to me, all you who are weak and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Its something that I have often shared with my friends who have HIV - who are staggering under the crashing loads of confusion and guilt.

As always, I can't solve Bill's problems. It is hard even to fully understand how much of what he is saying is true, but I do know that Bill desperately needs rest. Rest for his battered, emaciated body. Rest for his spinning mind. Rest of his love-starved soul. Rest for Bill - a precious child of God - wandering far from home - perhaps without a home.

We prayed together before I left. I think I saw a bit of rest in Bill's eyes as he thanked me.

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Just before I went, Simon, an elder from the church who has been shepherding the effort to help Bill, brought Bill some ice-cream. Bill cried and said that he had been craving ice-cream all day.