"She stood there with little emotion on a face that had Meth scabs mingled with freckles. 

She was young and going nowhere but down, but here at the shelter she had found a rest stop in the wandering. 

“I don’t know where I’m going or what’s next.” is the normal response I get to any inquiring questions about the future. The present is known, pretty much everything else “out there” is that part of ancient maps that say: “Here there be dragons”. 

The bodies of many guests in rescue and crisis shelters have dragon tooth wounds to prove it. Tracks or Scabs or both, often witness to the dark and desperate battles taking place in people’s bodies, minds and souls. 

Psalms 38:5-11

“My rotting wounds are a witness against me. They are severe and getting worse, reminding me of my failure and folly. I am completely broken because of what I’ve done. Gloom is all around me. My sins have bent me over to the ground. My inner being is shriveled up; my self-confidence crushed. Sick with fever, I’m left exhausted. Now I’m as cold as a corpse, and nothing is left inside me but great groaning filled with anguish. Lord, you know all my desires and deepest longings. My tears are liquid words, and you can read them all. My heart beats wildly, my strength is sapped, and the light of my eyes is going out. My friends stay far away from me, avoiding me like the plague. Even my family wants nothing to do with me.”

The oozing and partially scabbed over wounds are the byproducts of meth madness that results in 30-45% of meth addicts.  

“Meth mites, meth bugs, ice mites, or crank bugs are the names designated for the imaginary bugs that methamphetamine users believe are on and under their skin while on the drug. Meth mites are a result of a hallucination specifically called formication that is perceived through a sense of touch and sometimes sight. This sensation is so overwhelming that meth users will engage in intense itching and skin picking to try for relief.” -Banyan Treatment Centers 

The psalmist’s “cold as a corpse” description of living death captures the hell and horror of such addiction manifestations. 

Her arms were the Devil’s rosary.

My heart was heavy talking to this young girl, trying my best to look past her oozing sores to the daughter of God stiff and awkward before me. Short and polite answers to each question or comment but she’d drop almost every ball tossed to her because she wasn’t playing. She was here by necessity, not for recovery. A quick exhausted sit in the corner of the ring, but little intention of ending her dance with the dragons. 

In moments like these, I pray that these individuals will warm to the ministry of care that happens in the Shelters. That the coldness of the lying whispers will not lure them back to the streets. I know that lives literally hang in the balance, Death is at the door waiting to escort them back to the chaos they fled. 

Recently Maurice Smith of our local ‘Rising River Media’, an advocate and activist for the good of our community members struggling with homelessness and addiction told me: 

“The Spokesman-Review, the Spokane Medical Examiner stated that 104 people had died from a drug overdose in the first 5 months (154 days) of this year. 107 deaths spread over 154 days is 1 death every day-and-a-half (154/107=1.439).  Translated into hours, that's one death every 34.5 hours, or roughly 1 death every day-and-a-half or 36 hours. I went with 36 hours as a round number, but by doing so I actually understated the rate at which people are dying from drug overdoses in Spokane (some 64% of which are fentanyl related).” (https://myroadleadshome.org)

These numbers are horrific, I don’t want to acknowledge them, but “tracks and scabs” aren’t easily expunged from my memory, the gore gets me. I can’t imagine my own daughter or sons with pink arms of picked flesh. But these are someone’s kids and that compels me to try to be something helpful because I’d want someone to be there for my kids or grandkids. 

I sat there in the plastic chair waiting to take anyone wanting to go Church as she came up the hallway. She was checking out of the Shelter with her suitcase and a few other belongings and a plan to go to another city. 

We said goodbye and I noticed her “tracks and scabs” were healing up, becoming scars. 

“…keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life. And have mercy on those who doubt; save others by snatching them out of the fire; to others show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh.” Jude‬ ‭1‬:‭21‬-‭23‬

Not all who wander are lost, but most are, so I keep loving, waiting and snatching while hating the tracks and scabs. As she walked out of the shelter, in my heart I hoped and prayed that she wouldn’t ‘poke or pick’ again…but my mind knows better." 

Pastor Eric, Jacob's Well Spokane Wa.