Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

The earliest memories I have as a young child, are the memories of my mother praying with my sister Lena and me. I remember being three years old and she would kneel with us beside our bed, Lena on one side of her and I on the other and teach us this prayer. “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. If I should live to see other days, I pray the Lord to guide my ways.” And to that Lena and I would add, “And God bless Momma, Daddy, Granny, Grandma Lee and Libby.” (Libby was our big sister.)

After praying one night I asked her what did Jesus look like? She always brought us little Bible story books and read to us from them. I told her Jesus looked different in the different stories and books.
“Nobody really knows what Jesus looks like” she answered, “but you will see Him in the people He has made. His light will shine through them, and you’ll know it’s Him.”

For a long time as a child, I thought I would see Jesus shining like a flashlight in people. I have been young and now that I am old, I understand what she meant. Truly I have seen Jesus as His light shining bright through people.

One of those people who shined bright for Jesus was Mr. Robert J. Harris. He was a man of many God blessed talents and gifts. He founded the A. M. E. Zion Soup Kitchen and Men’s Shelter at the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church here in Washington.
His love, compassion and kindness truly exemplified the love and light of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I was deeply honored to be a former member of the Zion Shelter’s Board of Directors and a volunteer. I watched first-hand the love that flowed from him to each person he met, helped and served. The dignity he bestowed on every person that came to the shelter for a meal or a place to stay for the night, was the same dignity, compassion and grace Jesus would have given.

My life, like the lives of so many will forever be brightened by Mr. Harris’s love and light. My momma was so right. I have seen Jesus looking just like His people. I saw Him in Mr. Harris. I pray that I would continue his legacy of love and ministering to God’s people, and being a light like as Mr. Harris showed me how. I know the Lord will say to Mr. Harris “well done, my good and faithful servant well done.” To that I add, “Thank you Mr. Harris. Well done Mr. Harris, well done.”