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Homelessness and generally people in need are always one of those things where we all want to do something. Most people in New Zealand are basically pretty decent people. When disaster strikes, kiwis roll up their sleeves and are there for their neighbours, no matter what the circumstances.
It is a bit like that with helping people around town right now, there are groups of people just like you and I that are rolling up their sleeves and doing
some basic tasks that are making a huge difference. And it didn’t start with much, just a willingness to help a few people they knew and now it is helping
a whole lot of people they’d never met before.  This is a bit of my story and what I’ve seen.
I had three years working with ‘Base’ in Newton gully. Then they were moving out to Ellerslie to help more people so I strolled down the road and found another group in Newton gully working out of another basement who were doing some incredible things. They are part of Urban Vineyard and they call themselves the Action group. It sounded good so I went to a meeting and there were 5 people. I thought “wow this will be a bit of a challenge.” Feeling all superior – I had come from a huge group that ranged from 30 regulars to about 50 on a big event. So I asked them what they had done to date. This was a year ago (April 2009).

Two of them had been running a community house helping people rebuild their lives; the other two had started a food bank. The other one was involved in a community project where hundreds of people went out and helped people for free two or three times a year to rebuild homes, lives, take children in respite homes out for the day etc.

This was not what I expected to come from five strangers sitting in a room just trying to do something positive for those who were not in a position to help themselves. So I went to a few meetings and we got chatting about what else they were doing and they had adopted a local men’s hostel and were taking food and blankets to them once a month.
After a while we had about 8 of us and one of the people was a guy from the hostel we were being neighbours to in Grey Lynn. He got organised and
started helping with the food bank and next thing we have a few more of his mates turning up and then it just snowballed. All because five people got
together and wanted to make a difference around their local neighbourhood.  Everyone lived within walking distance from the basement.
The food bank got in touch with the City Mission and they began to give us their overflow food. It went from about 5 bags of food to around 20.This
didn’t include the 15 or so bags going to the people in the hostels. Now they have taken another hostel under their wing.

They also reached out to a local school that is decile 1 and can’t afford all its maintenance and went in and dug the gardens and cleaned and repaired the gym. Little things, every one of them won’t make headline news, they weren’t expensive or dramatic, but people’s lives have been changed for the long term. 

We all feel powerless when we walk past people on the streets, I want to adopt everyone and take them home. But I can’t, what I can do is –
something. I can give some food to the food bank, a packet of pasta, a can of baked beans. I can go and give the food out, I can bring a blanket or
some clothes, I can go on the work days, and I can make cups of tea for the workers.
It all matters, it all counts and every one of us, whether we are in big cities or small communities can make a difference. Throw a stone into a pool and the ripples will go right out to the edges. What we do everyday matters. Think of one thing you can do that will help someone else this week….
Next time I am going to tell you about the people giving lunches once a week to the people in their neighbourhood. It’s simple but we can all be part of the solution.

Tags: good news, to be homed