Christmas on the Corner
I wrote this over Christmas 2008 for the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.
With fire in his eyes and God in his ear, Johnny Landrum jumped. He was 39.
Gave away his stuff. Didn’t renew his lease. Quit his job. Painted “JESUSAVESOULS” on some wood.
He landed on the corner of University and 66th. There he awaits further instructions.
He won’t expect you to understand those, either. Such is the Lord’s work.
Johnny has been in business since the summer. He’s open every day except Saturday. God told him to rest on Saturday.
Why that corner? He didn’t know. He still doesn’t. He just obeyed — 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.
That’s what the Lord said to do.
One day he looked up — the 6600 block of 66th street… across from Phillips 66 — and didn’t feel quite so crazy about it.
He knows it seems crazy, though. He knows, he knows, he knows. He knows that’s why people stop and stare and ask questions and honk and take pictures and step on the gas because what else can they do? Here under the civilized American sun that shines equally on good and evil is a seemingly normal man who has seemingly shed the world.
But aww man, he’s not some saint. Girls are still good looking. MamaRita’s taco plates still taste good. It’s just that Johnny Landrum has seen the glory…
And his soul… is… HOOKED.
“I’ll tell you, Jeremy, I did not come to the Lord. I was not going around going ‘I gotta find my savior.’ I was out there lookin’ for stuff on this earth. And I ran into my savior.”
But why are you reading about Johnny Landrum? How did he become a superhero? Johnny on the Corner? The Cornerman?
The dots are hard to connect.
He got saved in 2000, on his knees in his living room, alone. Everything changed. It was full-time Jesus. But he went back to doing some bad stuff, trying things his way, and that just wasn’t going to work. He got married. It was great. He got divorced. It was terrible. He says it was like God had torn down his kingdom, like God had taken away his toys.
“It just wasn’t what God had planned for my life,” he says, looking way off.
A car honks. A man parks his car, gets out, and hands him some honey-glazed ham.
“Thank you.”
What were we talking about?
He cleaned toilets and hawked vitamins and sold shoes. This and that, here and there. He was good at it, too.
“God had me be responsible in the world before comin’ out here for him.”
Again, the dots are hard to connect. But one day — July 18th, the day he quit his job — God drew a hard, permanent line between the only two dots that mattered anymore: His will and Johnny’s soul. That’s why you’re reading about Johnny Landrum.
He put in his notice at work. He just felt like he was supposed to.
God had something for him.
He went home after his last day and just stayed there for a little while, praying and pondering. The lease on his duplex was running out. He slowly started giving away his possessions, even his truck. He heard someone talking about always needing a ride to work and he just turned around and tossed the guy the keys. He went into his now empty garage. He saw some wood someone had given him once upon a time, he saw some red paint, and soon he had a sign bearing the secret to life.
“JESUSAVESOULS”
He started walking. He walked into a United Supermarket. He held the wood, the sign, over his head.
“I just want everyone in here to know that Jesus saves souls,” he shouted. Some people clapped. The manager came over and politely told him he couldn’t do that.
He walked into a CiCi’s Pizza. He held the sign up.
“Jesus saves souls,” he said. People stared and chewed. He walked out.
This he did for three strange, happy days.
Jesus saves souls, Jesus saves souls, Jesus saves souls.
Then he threw the sign in the dumpster. The garbage truck came and went. But a week later, the sign was still there. Johnny picked it back up and went back out. By this time, August, he was hearing voices. “Corner, corner, corner.”
So Johnny took the sign to the corner of 34th and Quaker, where he held it for three more days, before throwing it back in the dumpster.
A week later, the sign was still there.
It was a sign.
And he’s followed it for nearly five months.
“Like I said, Jeremy, I don’t expect you to understand. But there are a lot of things that God is doing with this.”
Sometime — maybe September, maybe October — Johnny moved to his present office, 66th Street, the way of suffering. There, the medium has basically become the message.
If it were just a sign, people would drive by it. So he nailed it to a picket and stands with it… and his straight back, his chapped lips, and his numb toes are the exclamation points. That’s all part of it — it’s hard, man. His feet hurt like hell. And wouldn’t that be just like hell — just like the devil — to try to make him sit down?
If he sits down, it’s over.
“Listen to what’s inside you, Jeremy, and do what the Lord tells you. It may not be standing on a street corner. It may be supporting God’s work, you know? That make sense? I’m not telling anybody, ‘man you better get out here.’ But that’s what He told me to do.”
Soon the aches and pain and monotony began breaking up with little miracles. Hugs. Plates of food. Gift cards. Cash. Chocolate. Coats. Gloves. Television cameras. Reporters. Bottles of water. Bags of Bibles. Tears. Gratitude. Fruit.
Now it’s almost all day long. There is never a dull moment. The corner has become a hub, a living breathing bulletin board of faith and fellowship.
People who might roll their eyes riding past a man who Will Work For Food will high five Johnny Landrum with $20 bills and thank him for doing what they won’t. And all he does is stand there. All he does is stand there with a sign. All he does is stand there with a sign that says “Jesus Saves Souls.”
“Whatever God tells you to do, you do. But if all of us were out here on this corner, ha ha ha, holding this sign, ha ha ha… nothing else would be getting done. Some people he tells to be a good father and raise your kids right and ‘be an example of Me to your family.’ Some people he tells to go and feed the homeless. Some people he tells go stay at your job. Just do what the Lords’ telling you to do. Man, is it warm? Or did I get warm…”
Stacey Kollman, part owner of the three Lubbock-area Chicken Express restaurants, pulls up in a company van. Johnny smiles and waves.
“I can’t remember her name.”
She hugs him and then hands him a coupon for a free chicken dinner.
“I think he’s a good reminder of what we’re supposed to be doing,” she says.
One Sunday a while back, she asked Johnny to go to church with her. He didn’t.
“His reply to me was ‘this is where God put me. I’m here every day till six,” she says. “A lot of people talk to the talk, but few people walk the walk. My family has been blessed by him and I’m just returning the favor.”
A few days later, Bob Corcorran, owner of Riversmith’s Chicken and Catfish, shows up. He hands Johnny a business card. On the back he signs his name beneath a proclamation:
“Good for a free meal for Johnny Landrum as long as God permits.”
Who knows when Johnny will pay for chicken again?
As for a place to sleep, he stays with a family on 69th Street.
They said if he needed a place to go, to stop on by. When his lease ran out, he stopped on by.
What a quaint little racket! The celebrity mystic, clothed, domiciled, and fed by the curious, middle class ravens of Lubbock!
It’s not a racket.
The hats people give him? The extra gloves, the extra apples? He gives them away. The money they give him? He gives it away. One woman walked away from Johnny with tears in her eyes and more than a hundred dollars in her hand.
(You will know them by their fruit.)
“If God gives me money, it’s not for me, it’s meant for somebody,” Johnny says, offering me a bite of his apple.
It’s not a racket. He’s not crazy.
Look at the birds of the air? See the lilies of the field? Consider Johnny Landrum.
Johnny Landrum is for real.
“You never know if these things are real or not,” Betty Eckles half-shouted over the traffic. “I have to hope he’s doing it for the right reason. I asked him why he did it and he said he just wanted to share Jesus. To stand there like that, you’d have to be dedicated.”
Which is why she’s there on Christmas Eve. Which is why a family will pull up five minutes later just to talk to him. Which is why a father will bring his little girl to “go ahead and give Johnny a hug.”
People like dedicated. They want to be a part of dedicated and shake its hand and slip it a little something.
Eckles and her sister Barbara had been on their way to a family get-together. They pulled through the vacant lot. The gravel crunched and Johnny turned around. The women got out of the car with four 10-dollar bills. Betty handed her two to Johnny. He smiled and said thank you. Barbara handed her two to Celestino. He smiled and said thank you and tucked them into Johnny’s jump suit pocket.
Ol’ Celestino. Celestino Alvarado. 22 years old. Handsome. Searching. What a character.
Johnny Landrum’s disciple?
“Yeah, you might say that,” Johnny says, like he’s thought about it.
Celestino found Johnny when God allowed Celestino’s car to die on 66th Street.
“His prayer got answered,” Celestino says. “He wanted somebody to fellowship with him, to stand with him. And God got me out here… or else I would have been up to no good. Instead I’m here right now with my brother in Christ. That was what, two months ago, wasn’t it Johnny?”
Johnny can’t remember; Johnny doesn’t really care, so neither does Celestino. It doesn’t matter, anyway. It doesn’t matter when Jesus saves your soul. What matters is that Jesus saves souls. No, no, no… you don’t understand — JESUS SAVES SOULS.
Celestino’s out there with Johnny most every day. He’ll leave to do some laundry, or go see someone, but he comes back.
He was here with Johnny bright and early. It’s a cold Christmas morning, but not that cold. They start singing.
“I got Jesus, Jesus, Jesus — I got Jesus in my life. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus — Jesus in my life.”
Honk, honk, honk. Wave, wave, wave. The KCBD news crew has already come and gone.
“They came and asked about Christmas and Johnny gave it to’em,” Celestino says. “Everyday is Christmas on the corner!”
People brought food all day long — Christmas food, wrapped in foil. Candy canes. Coffee. Water. Johnny eats a little, drinks a little, and gives the rest away.
Jesus saves souls. Tomorrow will take care of itself.
The hours zoom by. It’s getting dark. It’s almost time. Johnny waits for God’s light to turn green.
A girl stands by Celestino. He’s holding the sign. They’re talking about church. Johnny’s a couple of feet away, talking to a man about producing good fruit, about doing what’s right. He’s excited. He’s using his hands a lot. Horns honk. Geese honk.
“People try to fake God out, man,” Johnny shouts over the noise. “You can’t fake God out.”
The man nods and nods and nods.
“Man, this was the best church I’ve had in a long time,” the man says.
There’s a beep from Johnny’s jump suit pocket. It’s his cell phone alarm. It’s a Samsung. He can’t call anyone on it. He just turns it on and uses it as a watch. Johnny picks it up. Six o’clock. Quittin’ time. Another 12 hours down. In 12 hours, he’ll be back.
The Christmas sun fades to orange and peppermint. But man, every day is Christmas on the corner.