Skid row....road....

Skid road....row.....

While touring Seattle yesterday, we went down the road designated "skid row". I had grown up with the term meaning the less desirable part of town...and this was the case as well in Seattle..you didn't drive down skid row or surely not walk through it...or if you had to, you locked your doors....

We were passing through the area which is near pioneer square with its beautiful train station  archways...and there was a mission church as well..to meet the spiritual needs of the people who frequent that area...beggars of all ages sitting around, including an elderly woman holding out a plastic cup for money...such a contrast from the vibrant life within sight at the pikes market place....which was crowded with shoppers....eating fresh fruit, seafood, ethnic foods, buying artwork, a profusion of flowers, crafts, etc....I didn't see a mission in this area whose patrons need the spiritual Input just as much as the poorer neighbors....

The Bible presents the poor, the  beggars as well...the field is leveled in the end, we all have a need of a Savior...rich or poor...some  realize it and ask, others go blithely through life not realizing it at all...looking at the skid row  residents, I can only say, "but by the  grace of God, go I"...His grace extends to all...

Thank You that you have extended your Grace to all who seek, ask and find...no matter the life lived, the past....just for the asking, the believing....for free...to all...You have paid the price...

Ephesians 2:8
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—

Matthew 26:11
The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me.

Mark 10:21
Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

Mark 12:42
But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.
Mark 12:43
Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others.

1 Corinthians 13:3
If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

James 2
New International Version (NIV)
Favoritism Forbidden

2 My brothers and sisters, believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ must not show favoritism. 2 Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in filthy old clothes also comes in. 3 If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” 4 have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

5 Listen, my dear brothers and sisters: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? 6 But you have dishonored the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? 7 Are they not the ones who are blaspheming the noble name of him to whom you belong?

8 If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. 9 But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. 10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. 11 For he who said, “You shall not commit adultery,”also said, “You shall not murder.”If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.

12 Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, 13 because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

"Skid row
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Skid Row)
This article is about high-vagrancy areas....

Skid row or skid road is a shabby urban area with cheap taverns, dive bars, and dilapidated hotels frequented by lowlifes, alcoholics, and itinerants. The term skid road originally referred to the path along which timber workers skidded logs. Its current sense appears to have originated in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. Areas identified by this name include Pioneer Square in Seattle; Old Town Chinatown, Portland, Oregon;  Downtown Eastside in Vancouver; Skid Row in Los Angeles, San Francisco's Tenderloin District, Montreal's Saint Catherine street's District and the Bowery section in lower Manhattan.

Origins
The term "skid road" dates back to the 17th century, when it referred to a log road, used to skid or drag logs through woods and bog. The term was in common usage in the mid-19th century and came to refer not just to the corduroy roads themselves, but to logging camps and mills all along the Pacific Coast.When a logger was fired he was "sent down the skid road."

The source of the term "skid road" as an urban district is heavily debated, and is generally identified as originating in either Seattle or Vancouver.

Seattle[edit]
The name "Skid Road" was in use in Seattle by 1865 when the city's historic Pioneer Square neighborhood began to expand from its commercial core. The district centered near the end of what is now Yesler Way, often said to have been the original "Skid Road" in the literal sense serving a saw mill owned by Henry Yesler.

Henry Yesler acquired land from Doc Maynard at a small point of land at what is today near the intersection of 1st Ave and Yesler Way. He also acquired a swath of land 450 feet wide from his property up First Hill to a box of land about 10 acres in size full of timber spanning what is today 20th to 30th Avenues. His steam-powered logging mill was built in 1853 on the point of land that looked south towards a small island (Denny's Island, part of his land purchase from Doc Maynard) that has since been filled in around and is the heart of today's Pioneer Square. The mill operated seven days a week, 24 hours per day on the waterfront.The street's end near the mill, attracted cookhouses and inexpensive hotels for itinerant workers, along with several establishments that served beer and liquor.

The Skid Road was built on that 450 foot wide slice of land from the top of First Hill to the logging mill on the point.[citation needed] Timber cut in nearby forests was greased and skidded down a long, steeply sloping dirt road. Since the building of the mill much of what is today's Seattle is the result of extensive terra-forming by the local people to make the hilly landscape of Seattle habitable. At the time of the building of the mill it was some of the only flat land available. The Skid Road became the demarcation line between the affluent members of Seattle and the mill workers and more rowdy portion of the population.The road became Mill Street, and eventually Yesler Way, but the nickname "Skid Road" was permanently associated with the district at the street's end."