If you’ve been following my Twitter account, you’ll know some of this news, but here’s a summary of the latest developments with the homeless alcoholic who’s been spending every morning on our doorstep for the last couple of months.
Whilst I was away on my conference last week, the Vicar arranged to take Gone to Betel in Nottingham. He decided that they could go by train, as Gone is anxious travelling by car. They agreed that folk from Betel would meet them at the station and take Gone by himself to their centre.
The journey went well, although Gone was still anxious about going to stay with people he didn’t yet know. He is very mistrustful, which I guess is a default position when you live on the street.
Once at the station, they had a while to wait and the Vicar spent the time calming Gone and assuring him of the warm welcome he’d receive once he got to the centre. The men from Betel arrived ‘looking like angels, they radiated so much joy’. Gone seemed happy to go with them, so after a prayer, the Vicar returned to the station and headed home to relieve our babysitters.
A good way for the anxious to travel
That was Tuesday evening. On Thursday morning our doorbell rang early. It was Gone. As you can imagine, the Vicar was very disappointed.
‘There were some men I knew from prison there and I was worried they would beat me up,’ said Gone. ‘I came back by train.’
The Vicar left Gone on the step and went to consider what to do. He rang Betel, who told him that Gone hadn’t actually made it to the centre. He’d been too anxious in the car and got out before they left the station. It is a big thing, to leave your familiar haunts and your regular life, however awful that life is.
I returned that afternoon and together the Vicar and I agreed that we would tell Gone that we couldn’t help him any more, save taking him back to Betel. We’ve been realising how his constant presence has been draining us both. The Vicar’s hardly done any parish visiting since Gone has been on our doorstep, and his predicament has been sapping much of our pastoral energy and our time. Gone has spent a few days thinking about it, and yesterday he had a second telephone interview with Betel and this evening the Vicar and another local pastor are going to drive over with him, right to the front door of the centre.
We still don’t know whether Gone will make it. It’s a massive step for him to change his life in this way, so we are praying that God will give him the courage to do it. I’ll keep you posted.
The Vicar's Wife 
Will be praying.
And now for something completely different: http://lifehacker.com/5313969/bake-cookies-on-your-dashboard
Interesting, but I’m not sure you could do it until summer next year!
Do take care of yourselves. It can be so emotionally draining – and damaging – if one person demands too much of you. We have been there and it can be so hard to get out, especially when there is little or no support for you in situations like this. Well done for telling him that you can’t help him any more – that’s a really hard thing to do.
Thanks Rector’s wife. I’ve just had words with Gone on our doorstep and pointed out how tired his presence is making us. It’s so sad to see him repeating his poor choices, and to hear of his desire to go to prison – he wants the bed, the food and the order in his life and is too scared to try Betel.
[…] On my first day back in the harness this week, I was thinking back to my first five months as a vicar and forward to the next term. Recent months have been dominated by “Gone”, the homeless alcoholic who sat on our doorstep every morning, sometimes ringing the bell at 6:30am and waking the kids. You can read the story of Gone over at the Vicar’s Wife. […]
Just read this after asking about Betel as my brother went there last thursday.
I was hoping to talk to someone who had been through it.
I really feel for you as my brother was ruining life with these demons and finally hit rock bottom and asked for help.
I know when I dropped him off the place looks fantastic and so welcoming but it just seemed do quick the way one minute my brother was in the car the next he was gone:(
But of my impression it looked like a wonderful place infact it looked like sanctuary I am just praying my brother grasps this opportunity with both hands and an open mind and really turns his life around.
I will pray for Gone that he finally does hit rock bottom and decideds to take the brave step ( I have come to realise that until they percieve they are at rock bottom they will then ask for help to change until then theyu will just take help in whatever form to aid their demons and it is hard seeing them sink deeper and deeper but I will be honest it is amazing when they truely ask for help and want to change for themselves not because of pressure, I have never felt as much respect for my brother when he finally asked for help)
Welcome to the Vicarage Sarah. Gone is still out of the picture here at the moment – Betel is too hard an ask for him just now.
We were told that it can sometimes take a few attempts to stick with Betel’s programme, but I pray that your brother will keep going, especially through the really tough first couple of weeks.
Was he taken to Betel today? He was banging on the door of a nearby vicarage at 9.05 this evening.
The Vicar just reported that he is asleep under our hedge! So alas not. Hope we can get the guys at the shop to sort him out. He was eager at 8.45am – too early to phone them & went to the shop. They weren’t open until 10am so I was hoping he’d seen them later and headed off. Seems not. Praying for tomorrow instead.
Seen him again today. He’s got hold of some money – I think some of his benefit money. So he was a) very drunk, and b) saying that he would never go to Betel. He did, however, bring a box of chocolates and a ‘Thank you for helping me’ card…
He’s just left our doorstep. The Joker & I returned after an evening out to find his radio blaring & a very unsuitable mag stashed in our flowerbed, but no Gone. Expect he’ll be under the hedge later tonight…
Ah. I see you’ve discovered Gone. I took him to the hostel but it was closed. I had to drop him at Wednesbury and head off to a funeral meeting. G4S also managed to give him an incorrect map – the drawn-on location of the hostel is on the wrong street (in fact, the correct location isn’t even on the map!).