People tell me churches once cared about the sojourner, those desperate people who are trying to get someplace where hope awaits. And they are striving to travel with little or nothing in their pocket. They need places to stay, to shower, to get a bit of encouragement and a boost for the long journey.

There are many biblical injunctions in the first five books of the Old Testament that believers should "love" the sojourner. In my mind, that means we ought to at least provide them with a narrow cot where they could sleep for a night or two.

This past year I have been interviewing pastors around the Twin Cities and getting tours of their church facilities. Some congregations have such incredible buildings with big offices and fellowship rooms and even gymnasiums where members and their friends can cavort and get firm. But few congregations have a sojourner's apartment. They have showers and conference rooms and kitchens, but no places where a poor, out-of-luck soul can find a bed and a bit of hospitality.

Just recently I chatted with the Rev. Peter Boehlke, an affable fellow with a congregation firmly entrenched in the city. This United Methodist congregation is not wealthy, and yet it members seem to find plenty of joy in their ministry. Younger families are responding every day to this neighborhood church that is making its way into the future with determination.

Every once in a while Boehlke will face a person who not only needs work, but also a place to sleep. He told about a fellow who appeared out of nowhere and asked for work. Boehlke had some tasks that needed the attention of a man with a wheelbarrow. He hired the guy, put him up in the church parlor, and after about 11 days of work, the man was on his way to his personal promised land.

I know what you're thinking - Boehlke took a big risk. Perhaps he did, but isn't compassion always a risk? When you reach out to help another human being in any way, you are risking disappointment or rejection. What if that man had torn apart the church lounge, trashed the bathroom and faked the work?

Just guessing here, but I think Boehlke would have pulled together a bunch of volunteers and they would have made the sojourner's folly into a sign of redemption for the congregation.

But there are at least two issues that get in the way. First, we have built such opulent palaces to materialism that most church members have come to believe the congregation's mission is to protect existing buildings and find ways to build more. In many churches, there is not one place in the entire structure where it would be acceptable for a tired or sick person to stretch out and catch a couple of winks.

What would happen if staff members found a disheveled person sleeping in a Sunday school room? Would they throw the bum out or find some ways to make the sojourner more comfortable? You'll have to answer that question, because every congregation will provide a different response. My guess is most congregations would give the sojourner a gentle but forced exit from church property.

The second issue is that most Americans have a deep fear of being without. In all our endeavors, we are driven to get stuff, and we fear that someday we will be living without stuff. And that is exactly where the religious message enters life. God doesn't call us to be collectors of stuff. God calls us to give it away and, in the process, to give ourselves away, fears and all.

Clark D. Morphew