Poverty and Service, Part 3

"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?" The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him." Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."

I spent a day a few weeks back with a guy in love with his hometown. He's lived there most of his life, serves there now and gave me a lifetime of thinking material as we drove the streets of Dallas. Turns out the term white trash is offensive. At least to a white kid who grew up in the wrong part of town, in a family with no money, on a street where you learned to fight or you either died or became the whipping boy of all the other kids. Turns out some kids by the age of 8 or 9 have to figure out how to stand up for themselves without telling mom or dad and without going to their teacher or principal because to do so would ensure certain death. Turns out some kids, all races and gender, see death too close and too soon and it leaves them sensitive to some of the terms and attitudes many of us have.

We were driving the streets of Dallas that day and we stopped at one point to visit an inner city mission group. They have offices down "there" which is to be expected. We met some folks, then got back in the car. We drove around a forgotten part of the city, a place where they aren't even trying gentrification, they simply tear down the houses and leave empty lots because that's easier to police than houses that might contain drug dealers, homeless folks or some other undesireable.

We were down by the Cotton Bowl, a place I'd always assumed was a great place, I mean they have the state fair there only to find out its a terrible neighborhood. We saw some stuff "go down", we drove around to some overpasses to see small communities of men and women, we watched some police activity and all the while he's telling me stories about things that have happened on particular street corners or in certain houses during his urban ministry experieneces. Then all of the sudden, in the midst of this, he says "There's the director of the inner city mission group's home. No lie, my first reaction was "What the heck is he doing down here?" Turns out he's married, with two small children, one of who is almost exactly the same age as my little boy. And there they live, in a terrible neighborhood full of all sorts of stuff, their kids will go to public school though people keep telling them they should take them out to the nicer Christian school--I'm sure its only because the education would be better.

Yesterday I was in Memphis. Ben and I were setting up some trips and spent a good portion of the afternoon with Pastor Jim. I like Pastor Jim. He's mid 40's with 2 kids. He pastors a community church and is one of those dudes with incredible faith and an amazing vocabulary. He uses phrases i don't hear much like "I believe by faith that she'll be back from lunch by the time we get over there. " And, "I believe God longs to use the church to be the change agent in our cities."

We went on a drive with him yesterday after lunch, its one of those drives I wish you could be along on. We drove through a couple neighborhoods, downtown, past the hotel where MLK was assasinated, pausing to look at the wreath commemorating that horrible moment and watching a couple news broadcasts about his wife who passed away yesterday. We drove by Elvis's favorite diner, by Sun Studios, past the old Baptist hospital where Elvis was pronounced dead, where Priscilla was born, through a terrible neighborhood, over by the zoo and ended up at a magnificent 3-story all brick Southern Baptist church. The property and building are valued at over $1 million. They got it for free.

Pastor Jim's church has been leasing a building since he's been there, 13 years. They couldn't afford a building but instead of doing any sort of fund they've decided to stay in the city, have an incredible outreach mission and trust God that in his timing he'd provide what they needed. So that's how we got hooked up with them--we've helped members of their church and a good chunk of people who are now members of the church. They have a homeless feeding program on friday nights, they have some overcomers groups for addicts, they've salvaged more marriages than I can count including a springer-esqe one where a guy moved in with his girlfriend and her husband and they lived together for over a year.

They have a number of "undesireables" in their midst because they have a reputation in the city that they are a place where you'll be loved and challenged but never condemned or looked down upon. He said on the average Sunday he's watching this beautiful mix of CEO sitting by recovering crack addict serving communion to the single mom sitting by the lifelong Christian. He has this crazy philosophy which I've only heard in classes that the church should reflect the community it is in and then go about changing that culture to look more like Christ.

We talked over lunch about all the churches that have moved out of the city to the east (read suburbs). It's in the words of Dwebb safe and white. It's got more money, you can get more land for less money all these good things and in the midst of it they've doomed city folks to hell. I have to be careful here becuase I believe in the suburban church, I just also am more and more frustrated that so many churches have moved out there and think one night a month sending a small delegation into the city absolves them.

So we walked the halls of this incredible building that Pastor Jim's church was given. And in God's hilarious kingdom a southern baptist church decided to give their building to a community church, for free. The rumor was that went over like a lead baloon with the SB's. We walked room to room and listened to this man dream, not of a huge church but a community impact. "We can do countless VBS's here, we can do day care for single moms for free so they can work and not worry about their children, we're going to use this as our office for our members who are going to go into the city reaching out, here's where we'll do our evangelism training for our street agents, here's the fellowship hall we're going to utilize for our homeless feeding program, here's the kitchen we'll cook the meals in, we think now we'll be able to meals more than once a week. Here's the area we're going to be able to run an after school.." Well, you get the idea.

In case you're wondering, I am headed somewhere with all this poverty and service stuff. This may be a bit of a sidetrack but I've got this theory running. It goes something like this. God rewards people who are faithful to him. I know, I'm probably wasted or something. God blesses churches who stay in the city. According to Pastor Jim this free building is all God. And to hear it given to him and instead of burying it in the ground till his master returns, they're investing it and I have this sneaking suspicion that 10 years from now we'll be in Memphis doing another set up trip and that place won't look anything like it did yessterday and that church won't be even as amazing as it is right now. I don't know if it will be bigger, they didn't seem to have much strategy on that outside of loving people and reaching their world and then maybe their church will grow. They don't seem to have near enough staff or programs in place (this is sarcasm) but it might just work. They haven't run 40 days of purpose yet but they might still grow.

Because they give a rip about the people that a lot of churches are too insert excuse here to reach. They won't be good tithers. They may not make good elders. They more than likely won't write any books that will sell millions. But they might change the culture of Memphis, Tennessee.

On another note, I put that above scripture because we were talking in our hotel room the other night and it was pointed out to me the response the expert in the law gives to the question. The story is obviously about the good samaritan and it struck my friend as interesting that the one who gave mercy was the good neighbor. Nothing is said about what he did, giving money or saving his life or any of that. Simply mercy. What if our church was known for that. Screw that, what if you or I were known as merciful people. I think that would be beautiful.