Book Review: What Difference do it make?

After my review of, Same Kind of Different as Me, I was contacted by Thomas Nelson to see if I might be interested in reading the follow-up book, What Difference do it make?.

If you read my review, you know that…

I was powerfully impacted by the book.  That book has forever changed how I view the homeless.  Because of that, I whole-heartedly wanted to read the second book.

In the follow-up book, excerpts are taken from the first book and interspersed with true stories of people all over America who were powerfully impacted and motivated to be a person who becomes the catalyst of change for the homeless in their area.

However, that wasn’t the most impacting part of the book for me.  It was how the journey that Ron and Denver unwittingly found themselves on together, actually mirrored my journey on so many levels.

Ron’s worldview of the homeless was judgmental, distant, and obligatory- he originally helped the homeless because he felt he had to – felt obligated by guilt. As shameful as it is, I was right there with him in book one and now again, in book two.  Ouch!

Denver’s worldview, on the other hand,  mirrored mine in the sense that he felt invisible.  The world around him had decided that he had very little worth, acceptability, or value. I can’t tell you how often I have felt that as one who is chronically ill.  The world expects us to be beautiful, bright, working, thin, involved, etc., and when you can’t, you are easily dismissed.  Again, I totally get that.

In, What difference do it make?, Denver became even more amazing to me.  Here is a man who started off as a slave, became homeless, served time, and then by God’s grace and goodness, became a painter, speaker, voice for the homeless, and a man of incredible wisdom, integrity, character and honesty.

Denver’s ability to cut to the chase continually blew me away throughout this book.  In a day and age where many people are masking, being politically correct and basically shying away from being real, here is an individual who says what he means and means what he says.

Denver’s ability to deal in truth is exposed when he says,

Since I been vistin a lotta churches, I hear people talkin ’bout how, after readin our story, they felt “led” to help the homeless, to come alongside the down-and-out.  But when it comes to helpin people that ain’t got much, God didn’t leave any room for feelin led.  [...]You know what he gon’ say?  He gon’ say, “You didn’t need to feel led ’cause I had done wrote it down in the Instruction Book.

In the margins of my book, I wrote,

Ouch!

Denver then goes on to close this portion of his story with this comment!

Most people want to be circled by safety, not by the unexpected.  The unexpected can take you out.  But the unexpected can also take you over and change your life.  Put a heart in you where a stone used to be.

In the margins of my book, I now wrote,

Wow!

So often I make excuses for why I can’t do something.  Or even worse, I judge another person who is down and out.  It is safer, easier, and less intrusive.  But that isn’t how God intended for me to live my life.

Sometimes, being an “A-Type” personality, I want to wait until I have become perfected in whatever it is that I want to accomplish.  How many opportunities have I let go past because I was working on perfecting myself.  Denver dispels any compunction I have had in the past to wait until I am ready when he says,

And needy people don’t need no perfect people neither.  When Jesus sent His disciples out, He sent Peter right along, knowin Peter had a bad temper and a potty mouth and was gon’ deny Him three times.  He sent John and James even though they was full a’ pride and fightin over the best seat at the table.  He even sent Judas, knowin’ Judas was gon’ betray Him.  Even though Jesus knowed all a their sin and weakness, He sent ‘em anyway.

I don’t know about you, but that wipes away years of excuses!  In the end, it doesn’t matter if you are a person of faith or not.  It is our human responsibility to take care of those who have less than us.  How we choose to do that, is up to us in the end.  Finding excuses to get out of doing something, isn’t.

Ron sums up the theme of his and Denver’s life mission eloquently when he says,

They taught me not to ask myself what would happen to me if I stopped to help someone in the street but to ask myself what will happen to them if I don’t?

Isn’t that what this journey we call life is really all about?

These men’s testimony has really impacted me because like Denver, I find myself dismissed, demeaned, and discarded on a regular basis by the medical world, many of my past relationships, and the world in general because I struggle every day with an illness no one can see.  I understand the pain of being marginalized by a world that is too busy to take a minute and reach out and help.

After reading both of these books, I will no longer be able to see a homeless person and not offer whatever help I can.  I may not be physically able to start an organization as many people in the book were moved to do but I can use my words to motivate those that can and I can offer whatever I have to give whenever I can.

How about you?  I dare you to read these books and not be impacted or changed!  I don’t think it is possible!

*I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their Blogging 4 Books program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

Determined to continue forward,