What is it you do here?

Where else can a guy rant than on his own blog? So here I go. NLEC’s headquarters have been located at 1411 Locust Street since 1976. For thirty-seven years at this location, the church where I pastor has been sharing its resources with poor and homeless people. Since 1982 we have been bringing this poverty into viewer’s homes through KNLC-TV Channel 24. Thousands of people of all races, sexes, ages, and classes have passed through these doors. But right now the city of St. Louis can’t figure out what it is we do. There’s a name for that. It’s called willful ignorance. I learned yesterday that an attorney for residents in Downtown West has filed with the city attorney to declare our property a nuisance and have its operating license revoked.

This morning I’m standing in the lobby at this location staring at a note from a doctor at Barnes Hospital that tells me his patient cannot take the stairs, and needs a lower bunk. Amazing. Prescribing how to care for a patient who is obviously not sick enough that he can’t be sent here.
Yesterday I assisted in arranging a bus ticket for a young pregnant woman back home to a northern state. We payed for more of the ticket than originally anticipated. But what were the months of shelter nights worth? Not much to 160+ residents in the area.
A disabled man with an added mental disability stayed every night through the winter and into spring. I know he gets a check. I refer him to a nearby PATH agency that administers state mental health funds. They meet with him many times but he stops making his appointments and says he doesnt want to use his check for housing. When I find out I give him a letter that lets him know his last night is coming up and that he should accept services.
He asks me if I like him. I tell him yes, and then remind him of his appointment and his last day.
What is it we do anyway? We can’t shelter people forever. There aren’t enough beds or space. People belong in their own houses, not shelters.
But the number of doubled up families and people barely getting by is not reflected in annual federal shelter counts. The number of homeless children in city and county schools is in the thousands, but they are tucked out of public view. $1000 a month to stay in an extended stay hotel room keeps a family out of the shelter system and off the street, but it also ensures they’re trapped paying way too much for one room and a bathroom.
Social workers easily remark about clients many barriers, but I am sick of this dirty rotten stinking system. I’m tired of the apathy over how people become homeless. The shoulder shrugging over where or if shelters should be placed. This region conveniently forgets its homeless and helps reify the stigma that only lazy, ugly, useless ppl need be homeless. Thats a lie. The visible poor are our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, grandfathers and aunts. They are being beaten, raped and murdered while we shrug and imagine our leaders must be doing all they can. Convenient lie.
I’m so grateful for the many courageous people I know who are sick of this and are telling the truth about their situation. Come join the Metro St Louis Coalition for the Homeless on May 18 at Soldiers Memorial from 1:30-3:00 PM. http://stlouishomeless.org

New sermon: Friendship and Kindness

Friendship and Kindness

“The opposite of poverty is not plenty but friendship.”
—Kelly S. Johnson, The Fear of Beggars, pg. 209.

Dear Friends,
Companionship is what people really need to survive in this world. We need to learn to love and be loved. Nothing at all can substitute for the satisfaction of being surrounded by friends who will encourage us, remind us of life’s simple pleasures, and ground us in the truth of who we are in Jesus Christ. Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 says, “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”
In prison the Apostle Paul reminded his friends about the unity of the Spirit. “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph. 4:1-6)
A wise man once said, “You only love God as much as the one you love the least.” As we grow in Christ we learn to suffer to the glory of God. Our friendship in Christ does not shield us from suffering in this life. The courage we get from serving Christ leads us into ever darker places where the Spirit of God calls us.
Jean-Pierre Decaussad wrote, “The life of faith is nothing less than the continued pursuit of God through all that disguises, disfigures, destroys and, so to say, annihilates Him. It is in very truth a reproduction of the life of Mary who, from the Stable to the Cross, remained unalterably united to that God whom all the world misunderstood, abandoned, and persecuted. In like manner faithful souls endure a constant succession of trials. God hides beneath veils of darkness and illusive appearances which make His will difficult to recognize; but in spite of every obstacle these souls follow Him and love Him even to the death of the Cross. They know that, leaving the darkness they must run after the light of this divine Sun which, from its rising to its setting, however dark and thick may be the clouds that obscure it, enlightens, warms, and inflames the faithful hearts that bless, praise and contemplate it during the whole circle of its mysterious course.”
Jesus told us that there is no greater love than what he demonstrated on the cross. “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) That love is found in obedience to his command to love each other. The Holy Spirit binds us into commitment to each other, to strengthen and encourage each other whatever comes our way. “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace” (1 Peter 4:8-10, ESV)
Let me explain this love a little further. In the love of God there is a commitment to the truth that is eternal. It is so much stronger than even the most hurtful, vile, untrue words spoken. It is stronger than the cruel violence that men show each other when they get drunk and roudy. It is stronger than the lust that people have for power, for beauty, and for youth. We share in the love of God that endures misunderstanding, mockery, and abuse. And the only way we share in it is by clinging to Jesus Christ and abandoning ourselves to His will.
James Martineau wrote that, “The only life which is not worth living is not of God’s giving, but of our own creation, the life of no duty, no love, no trust”, and then he went on to write, “No felt evil or defect becomes divine until it is inevitable; and only when resistance to it is exhausted and hope has fled, does surrender cease to be premature. The hardness of our task lies here; that we have to strive against the grievous things of life, while hope remains, as if they were evil; and then, when the stroke has fallen, to accept them from the hand of God, and doubt not they are good. But to the loving, trusting heart, all things are possible; and even this instant change, from overstrained will to sorrowful repose, from fullest resistance to complete surrender is realized without convulsion.”
Without having loving, trusting hearts there is no way to be a true friend. Friendships that endure transcend time and place. We pray for one another and encourage one another in doing the will of God, trusting that if that separates us physically, our love in Christ will continue. Does this make us impervious to pain and sorrow? Not at all, in fact, we feel the separation more deeply.
In the fall of last year I lost a good friend (Rev. Slim Cox) who I had made music with for a few years. We edited a book together. When my mother died I knew I could call my friend and he and his wife sang to me on the phone. There’s not a lot of people that will do that. Since he has passed away I have gained a new appreciation for his life and ministry. I’ve been listening to his music more, hearing many songs from their back catalog on LP albums that I’d never heard before. I marvel at the unique and energetic expression of faith that this friend and his family displayed for decades even before I ever knew them. Though I miss him I know that his ministry is still present in the lives of so many people, myself included, who love Jesus and tell the truth of the gospel.
That’s how it works. Friendship never really fades away because we pass into eternity glorifying the God who brought us through all our trials. My friend was always singing about heaven even though he’d never been there. He loved heaven because he loved Jesus and he trusted that all his friends were either already there or were bound to be there soon with him. How can that not be a reason for joy, and even for shouting!
I have a hard memory about myself and Slim though, too. The last time we played together on TV I felt like everything went wrong. His timing was off and I couldn’t tell what he would do next. I got so embarrassed that I just ducked out the door and back up to my office. Later when he had left I came down and complained about it to some other friends. I said mean things that I can’t take back about what happened, mostly out of my embarrassment. He never knew I said them, but when I think back on that day I ask, “Why did I not have more patience?” I couldn’t have known how much more time we would have together. I knew he was sick, but I didn’t know how sick. Within a few weeks he was gone.
This is also part of friendship. We know that because we are sinners we never really get it completely right. We don’t speak up when we should, and other times we say things that are misplaced and hurtful. This is where trust and kindness come in. For example, my wife trusts that I love her even when I get angry and say things I shouldn’t, because she has seen me return and work it out with sincere repentance again and again. She knows that I love Jesus. That love for Jesus has grown deeper and stronger over the last 18-19 years we’ve been together. We’ve been through some seriously dark times, times when there was no way we trusted each other. But God has brought us through.
So now I want to look at five things the Bible says we need for true friendship in this world today. First, to be a true friend you have to be God’s friend. Some might say, “Well that let’s me out. I can’t be God’s friend because he hates me. I can’t ever do right enough to be God’s friend.” If God had not loved you first, that might be true. But let me tell you what God did in my life. God took a man so full of himself, so proud and isolated, a preacher’s kid who just wanted to run from God, and he broke me down until I slowly really got to know God. It took me a long time but I came to learn that as sick as I was, God was for me. That relationship with God is for you too.
Now here’s a second thing: the Bible makes it clear that being full of the love of God means that the darkness in this world will feel threatened and will fight back. Being full of the light of Christ is threatening. God’s love shines a light on sin, and this world loves sin. The churches that St. James wrote to probably didn’t like it, but he said, “You adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with this world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again, that if your aim is to enjoy this world, you can’t be a friend of God.”(NLT) 1 John 2:15-17 says, “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world — the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does — comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.”(NIV)
Let me put it in plain terms. If you are serving in ministry and you have to lie about your love for someone to your coworkers, than before God you know something is wrong. If you are new in downtown and you have been warned not to go to a particular place alone and you think you’re smart and strong enough to do it anyway, than when you get hurt you should know something is wrong—not with downtown but with you!
Third, we might wish that following Jesus meant that we didn’t have to deal with our own sin anymore, but we are told to crucify the flesh. In theory being righteous is a clean business. It’s easy to say, “He shoulda just stayed away from that woman.” But in reality we battle temptations to sin every moment. Sin involves self delusion and of course when you’re deluded you think you’re seeing straight. That’s why we need friends to help us see the truth! Here’s how I roll with that. It would be much better if you walked up to me and told me that you were quitting the ministry because you want to have five beers and watch porn every night, than to lie to me that you’re going to care for your dying sister in Albuquerque. Why? Because telling someone the truth just might give you the chance to see yourself rightly.
Remember what Paul said to the Galatians (5:16-26): “So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.”
We have so much to look forward to for ourselves as we walk in the Spirit. I want to be full of the love of God. I want to be full of his joy and peace, don’t you? I need patience. I want God’s kindness, goodness, and faithfulness to infect me all over to where every pore of my skin just exudes his faithfulness! I expect that with God’s gentleness and self-control there is nothing that God can’t accomplish. The price of living by the Spirit of God is giving Him all the credit. When you give God all the credit for what He has done in your life, than you can also say that when the world wants to kill you, it’s because of the good God is doing.
Finally Romans 13:14 says, “But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.” When we are caught up in the love of Christ, when we are loving one another in His love, it makes it easier to know what to do. I won’t say that there’s some easy formula to love because people are all unique and we all have our own set of needs and barriers. But I will say that the love of Christ has the power to free the soul from sin and self and set it in right relation to God in the Church. You don’t have to have all the answers to let God’s Spirit use you. The truth will set you free if you let it.
Let’s go to the Lord in prayer now.

You have blessed us, Heavenly Father, with the gift of friendship, the bonding of persons in a circle of love. We thank you for such a blessing: for friends who love us, who share our sorrows, who laugh with us in celebration, who bear our pain, who need us as we need them, who weep as we weep, who hold us when words fail, and who give us the freedom to be ourselves. Bless our friends with health, wholeness, life, and love. Help me, O God, to be a good and true friend.
To be always loyal, and never to let my friends down; never to talk about them behind their backs in a way in which I would not do before their faces; never to betray a confidence or talk about the things about which I ought to be silent;
Always to be ready to share everything I have; to be as true to my friends as I would wish them to be to me. This I ask for the sake of You who are the greatest and the truest of all friends, In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.

Yours in Christ,

Rev. Chris L. Rice

The Song to the Lamb

The Song to the Lamb

Dear Friends,

Don’t you care about who holds power? Who is in control? And don’t you wish you knew what the future held for you and those you care about? Doesn’t it bother you that people have all kinds of solutions to big problems but nothing seems to really change? Or if it does change for the better, must it always change back into a bigger mess? Where does our hope lie? What can we really put our trust in? I believe God is in control and that as we worship him he draws us into his presence and accomplishes his will. Let’s pray now.

Lord we come to you recognizing that we are utterly sinful. We have not loved You or each other as we ought. We have missed all your splendor and beauty and become distracted by our sin and the misery around us in this world. Forgive us our sins and heal us. Open your Word up to us and show us Jesus in a new and powerful way. Teach us a new song of praise and guide us in your ways. Amen.

As we gather in the presence of the Lord today I’d like to combine elements of responsive reading and songs of praise with the Scripture reading and sermon. It is not enough to hear with our ears. We owe Christ our everything! This service might seem a little bit different, but I can’t just talk about worship, I want us to adore the Lamb of God together with all the saints and angels of God in the book of Revelation. Did you know that the perpetual worship and prayer does not stop? That is where the true power is. The New Testament teaches us that Jesus did not argue with the powerful but took on himself the wrath of the empire. He stayed silent.

“When he was accused by the chief priests and the elders, he gave no answer. Then Pilate asked him, “Don’t you hear the testimony they are bringing against you?”  But Jesus made no reply, not even to a single charge—to the great amazement of the governor. “(Matthew 27:12-14, NIV)

Instead of defending himself, Peter tells us that Christ entrusted himself to God.

“He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” For “you were like sheep going astray,” but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. (1 Peter 2:22-25, NIV)

The Evangelist Philip met an African Jewish man on the road and he taught him that Jesus was the fulfillment of Isaiah 53.

“This is the passage of Scripture the eunuch was reading:

‘He was led like a sheep to the slaughter,
and as a lamb before its shearer is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
In his humiliation he was deprived of justice.
Who can speak of his descendants?
For his life was taken from the earth.’” (Acts 8:32-33, NIV)

Jesus is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Let’s read this responsive prayer together. I’ll read the first line with the asterisks aloud and you read each line following.

 

Christ our Passover (Pascha nostrum)

1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Romans 6:9-11; 1 Corinthians 15:20-22

Alleluia.

Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us; *

therefore let us keep the feast,

Not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, *

but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Alleluia.

Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; *

death no longer has dominion over him.

The death that he died, he died to sin, once for all; *

but the life he lives, he lives to God.

So also consider yourselves dead to sin, *

and alive to God in Jesus Christ our Lord. Alleluia.

Christ has been raised from the dead, *

the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

For since by a man came death, *

by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.

For as in Adam all die, *

so also in Christ shall all be made alive. Alleluia.

(Book of Common Prayer, pg. 83)

 

Sing: Behold the Lamb of God by Glenn Kaiser

Behold the Lamb of God
Who takes away
Who takes away the sins of the world
Behold the Lamb
Of God
White as snow
Pure as gold
Greater love the world
Will never know!

 

In Revelation chapters four and five John the Seer is shown a scroll with writing on the front and side. In it is held the secret of what is yet to come. No one on heaven or earth can be found to open it and John weeps. How can he tell what he sees unless it is opened? But then the lamb of God takes the scroll and opens it. He alone is worthy. We face a lot of uncertainty in our country today. Our elected leaders blame each other a lot for our country’s poor, and they blame each other for being a government that stays in debt. But the American people overall still don’t turn out to vote in elections like they did in the 1950s. There’s a lot of talk, and politics is an important source of entertainment in our country, but people still feel quite frustrated and powerless. The churches of Asia Minor who are addressed in Revelation were beset with many fears about their future. But the letter raised their gaze from the darkness of their uncertainty and gave them a window into heaven. Frank Senn writes:

“The premise of this literature is that those oppressed for their faith see no hope for salvation on the plane of human history. Indeed, the battle being fought is not to be understood just in terms of politics and economics, but in terms of “spiritual powers in high places.” So the apocalyptic writers looked beyond current history to the dramatic and miraculous intervention of God, who would set right the injustices inflicted on his people. They offer words of hope and encouragement to the persecuted faithful by envisioning the vindication of the elect in the resurrection of the dead and the blessing of heavenly life, the coming judgment of the world, and the creation of a new Jerusalem.”  (Frank C. Senn, The People’s Work: A Social History of the Liturgy, pg. 46)

I was taking pictures and video at a government press conference recently. As I listened to all the verbal backslapping and endorsements, the proud accomplishments and calls for adulation, I could not help but think of how much this scene resembled a worship service. Each appointed leader was like a minister, marveling at what the government had accomplished and calling for praise at what would surely be done in the future. They promised that they were changing the course of history for the whole world to see. A paid consultant promised us all that our grandchildren would look back to this moment like previous generations looked to the Emancipation Proclamation.

Civic and state worship is painful however to anyone who loves Jesus more than anything, and who is fully engaged in loving the least of these. Roman citizens found Christians so repugnant because they couldn’t just love Jesus alongside the Emperor cult. Jesus had to have the title of Lord instead of the Emperor. Frank Senn helps us understand the worship of the Lamb of God in this context:

“In a scene reminiscent of the honors given to a Roman emperor, large numbers of heavenly beings sing of Christ’s worthiness to disclose God’s plans. There are seven honors he is worthy to receive. (Rev. 5:12) The first four concern his dominion: power, wealth, wisdom, might; the others express the adoration of those present: honor, glory, blessing. The “Lamb” and the Creator (“the one seated on the throne”) are equal in majesty and are equally worthy to receive “blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever” (v. 13). All creatures in heaven and on earth affirm this to be true by saying, “Amen”. (The People’s Work, pg. 50)“

No one gets our worship today but Jesus. Join with me in reading aloud “A Song to the Lamb.”

 

A Song to the Lamb (Dignus es)

Revelation 4:11; 5:9-10, 13

Splendor and honor and kingly power *

are yours by right, O Lord our God,

For you created everything that is, *

and by your will they were created and have their being;

And yours by right, O Lamb that was slain, *

for with your blood you have redeemed for God,

From every family, language, people, and nation, *

a kingdom of priests to serve our God.

And so, to him who sits upon the throne, *

and to Christ the Lamb,

Be worship and praise, dominion and splendor, *

for ever and for evermore.

(Book of Common Prayer, pg. 93-94)

 

Song: Ancient of Days by Jamie Harvill and Gary Sadler

 

BLESSING AND HONOUR, GLORY AND
POWER
BE UNTO THE ANCIENT OF DAYS
FROM EVERY NATION, ALL OF CREATION
BOW BEFORE THE ANCIENT OF DAYS

CHORUS:

EVERY TONGUE IN HEAVEN AND EARTH
SHALL DECLARE YOUR GLORY
EVERY KNEE SHALL BOW AT YOUR
THRONE
IN WORSHIP

YOU WILL BE EXALTED, O GOD
AND YOUR KINGDOM
SHALL NOT PASS AWAY
O ANCIENT OF DAYS

BRIDGE:

YOUR KINGDOM SHALL REIGN
OVER ALL THE EARTH,
SING UNTO THE ANCIENT OF DAYS
FOR NONE CAN COMPARE
TO YOUR MATCHLESS WORTH,
SING UNTO THE, ANCIENT OF DAYS

 

Closing Benediction:

“In the sight of God, who gives life to everything, and of Christ Jesus, who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep this command without spot or blame until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which God will bring about in his own time—God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen. Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.  Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life. (1Timothy 6:13-19, NIV)

 

Closing Prayer:

Almighty, everlasting God, let our prayer in your sight be as incense, the lifting up of our hands as the evening sacrifice. Give us grace to behold you, present in your Word and Sacraments, and to recognize you in the lives of those around us. Stir up in us the flame of that love which burned in the heart of your Son as he bore his passion, and let it burn in us to eternal life and to the ages of ages. Amen.

 

Yours in Christ,

 

 

Rev. Chris Rice

Homeless service observations

There are two kinds of homeless people: the ones who qualify for government funded programs and those who don’t. Homeless Service departments should not speak as though they are in charge of all the homeless, any more than any political appointees are in charge of any other human beings.

There is nothing simple about public human services especially where it concerns the homeless. So why does the Ten Year Plan to End Chronic and Veteran Homelessness presume to speak for the homeless to the public about housing everyone?

The only way to end all types of homelessness is with affordable housing that is locally made available. If cities rely solely on federal and state money to make affordable housing available, and they regularly foreclose and condemn other properties they can’t expect the problem to go away.

We can’t find solutions to homelessness by patronizing and demonizing faith-based organizations who feed and shelter the homeless simply because they won’t restructure their programs along federally mandated lines. The day a developer gets to tell his neighboring church that their services aren’t needed and that they should move is when it is clear that neighborhood is not for everyone.

Just a thought: what if every public planning and zoning meeting, every streets and sanitation meeting, every parks and recreation meeting, were attended by about 10 homeless persons? What if they wanted a say in all of it? What would happen if it were no longer assumed that every citizen of every city or county or township had a place to call home but wanted a say in public meetings?

“The Blessing At The End Of Your Rope

Dear Friends,

Today I want to look at what it means to be truly happy by being right with God. I’ve always been suspicious when people talk to me about having a happy day. When I was in junior high school there was a girl in my class who had severe mood swings. The first thing she would do when she came in in the mornings was to announce whether or not this was going to be a good day. She’d say, “I’m really feeling UP today, this is going to be a good day!” or she’d say, “This is going to be one of THOSE days” and her hair would be disheveled and she’d be dropping books and straightening her skirt. I knew there had to be more to happiness then the color of a 50 cent mood ring. When I was that age, happiness was being left alone by people who wanted to talk to me about their being happy.

I want to begin by saying with confidence that God did not create human beings to be depressed, broken, frail, miserable people. There have been times in my life where I believed so adamantly in my fear, doubt, and shame that nothing anyone could tell me, truth or not, was going to change me. The only thing I knew for certain was that everything I thought was true didn’t work for me. I started living a double life. The life people saw on the outside, a young man working full time in ministry, a humble servant, was not truly who I was. From about 1995 up until 2008, over all I guess a period of about 13 years, I tried to reinvent myself and start over again and again and again. No amount of “I’m sorries, let me start over” made any difference. Sometimes I really felt like I was doing good. Some days I was really up. But then I would mysteriously break off and turn my back on God in crazy ways and it was clear to everyone who knew me that I was really down.

I am so happy today to tell you that I never have to live that way again! And if in any way that’s been your experience that is not what God wants for you either. The beginning of the BLESSED life, a truly happy life, comes in being a beggar. WHAT?!! Why a beggar? Now I know, these days in our town beggars aren’t really poor they’re just all drug addicts, right? That’s what some will tell you. Whether or not begging has fallen out of favor in America, Jesus says that to begin the truly blessed life it takes being poor in spirit. Some might say, “Oh you mean HUMBLE.” But don’t jump to conclusions.

Humility is not something we all have, or easily get. Think about all the things people say about poverty.

“Poverty is a result of ignorance.”

“Poverty is the result of lack of opportunity.”

“It’s a result of the dissolution of family.”

“It’s a result of a lack of good work to do.”

Well, this is what humility is like. It is more of a state of recognition rather than some virtuous character trait. It is the recognition that compared to God, I am ignorant, without opportunity, without support, and I have no way to change this. That is what I mean by humility and being a beggar in spirit. My happiness is completely contingent upon who God is. And this is only the beginning.

The Psalmist speaks of what God does, “The works of his hands are faithful and just; all his precepts are trustworthy. They are established for ever and ever, enacted in faithfulness and uprightness. He provided redemption for his people; he ordained his covenant forever—holy and awesome is his name. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding. To him belongs eternal praise.” (Psalm 111:7-10, NIV)

With very few words, thirteen of them, Jesus tells us who we are in him and what we can be certain of. It is as though he renews the whole world by the words of his mouth. He is the Word of Life. He was there at creation, and so why not?

“Blessed are ( happy, to be envied, and spiritually prosperous—with life-joy and satisfaction in God’s favor and salvation, regardless of their outward conditions)

 

. . . the poor in spirit (the humble, who rate themselves insignificant)

 

. . . for theirs IS [WITHOUT ANY DOUBT YOU HAVE]

 

. . . the kingdom of heaven. [God’s Rule, his Way, his Will, here and now]

(Matthew 5:3, Amplified)

 

The Message by Eugene Peterson puts it this way, “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.” I like that. In my life it took complete and utter defeat for me to recognize how arrogant and selfish I was. I was willing to risk everything I really cared about in order to shake my fist in God’s face and be right. To make matters worse I hid it all under the mask of shame. Sin made me stupid that way. I knew it was my own fault that I was a wreck, so just to prove it to myself, lest I forgot, I went back out there to try some more pain.

The answer was in surrender the whole time. And not only surrender but also “the actions of love to improve my relations with others”. Some of you might hear these words and think, “I’ve heard all that recovery jargon” but it didn’t work for me. Some of you have spent years sitting in recovery meetings, and you think of that time like it was some little university for learning about yourself, but you’re wiser now. You’ve graduated from the twelve steps. Really? How’s that workin for you now that you’re on your own again? How’s that pride working for you?

There is no way to be proud and blessed at the same time. If you’ve got it all together, you don’t need God or anybody else to make you think any different. All I know is that the kingdom of heaven is for beggars like me. People who know that without God’s Will and his people they would be living the words of Ozzy Osbourn’s song “Crazy Train”: “mental wounds not healing/ who and what’s to blame/ going off the rails on the crazy train”.

Like I said before, this is only the beginning, but we’ve got to start somewhere. If you can recognize that you’re not God and you play his role very poorly, then you can start seeing his image in other people. The blessed reign of God is for us poor sinners. Paul describes what it looks like, “Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty (snobbish, high-minded, exclusive), but readily adjust yourself to [people, things] and give yourselves to humble tasks. Never overestimate yourself or be wise in your own conceits.” (Rom. 12:16, Amplified)

Whenever I hear someone thinking aloud to themselves about how they will control another person, saying something like, “I’m just going to put duct tape over her mouth”, I realize how psychotic I myself can be. It unnerves me when politicians devise ways of controlling populations they consider problems, (consider the barricades around this building) but then I sometimes sit and think about what I’m going to do if so and so does this and that to me again.

There is no way to live in harmony with one another while at the same time thinking you have the right to slack off from chores, mouth off at people who bother you, give the cold shoulder, and hold resentment in your heart. All of these are ways of being haughty, even though we might think we’re just protecting our personal space.

Here are some of the crazy things I say to myself:

“If I don’t mouth off at people they’ll just walk all over me.”

“I can’t let what he said stand. I’ve got to stop him from hurting this other person.”

And let me tell you what God has been teaching me in response. I am no good at doing God’s work for him. Does God ever put his finger over my mouth in mid sentence to keep me from saying something foolish? No. He just lets me make my own mistakes. Very often I can only recognize what a sinner I am, by the stupid things I say. And God’s mercy draws me back to him. Yes, words hurt, but people don’t change if they can’t recognize their own mistakes.

Dorothy Day had these words for those seeking true poverty of spirit: “I can only say we should not be looking to the romantic, outer aspects of poverty, the sack cloth, the bare feet, the unshaven look, but give ourselves generously, at each moment of our time, our listening, whatever we possess of talents, or books or understanding, with patience and with love, and we would begin to be truly self-sacrificing and poor.” You and I are truly blessed that God considers us worthy to be servants in his kingdom. Our time, our talents, our patience with love, are his gifts!

This world thinks that the real reason for work is for self actualization. We can see work instead as a way of sharing our lives with others. You might say, “Well that’s all well and good in church or as a volunteer serving a meal, but I have terrible coworkers at the plant where I get my paycheck.” If you are a blessed beggar, it doesn’t matter what you do or where! No situation or person can take away who you are in Christ. The kingdom of heaven is yours!

I’ve heard that the gospel is simply like one beggar telling another one where to find bread. I love that! Some people think that coming to faith is about having an emotional experience where you cry until your nose runs all over your clothes. Others think it’s a high unlike any they could get doing drugs. For some religion is about having someone else tell you what to do with every move you make. None of that is true! We begin in faith when we simply recognize who we are and where what we’re truly longing for is found.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote this poem in prison titled “Christians and Heathens”.

“People go to God in their need,
plead for help, ask for happiness and bread,
for deliverance from sickness, guilt, and death.
So do we all, all of us, Christian and heathen.

People go to God in his need,
find him poor, abused, homeless, without bread,
see him entangled in sin, weakness, and death.

Christians stand by God in his suffering.

God goes to all people in their need,
satisfies them body and soul with his bread,
dies for Christian and heathen on the cross of death,
and forgives them both.”

(Letters and Papers from Prison, DBW 8, pg. 460, 2010.)

 

When we are at the end our rope, we finally stoop low enough to learn that God is present with us in our confusion. God is present for those who have given up trying to learn what life is all about. I have a very good friend who feels so hurt and confused by religion in all its forms that he’s not sure what he can believe anymore. I believe God is for him right where he is now. Some people hate everything related to the word Jesus, but God has still not abandoned them yet. I love God for that. I’m a guy who had to surrender all he thought he knew about God, all my righteous talk, in order to finally be at the end of my rope. And the kingdom of heaven is for the beggars who can’t wrap their heads around God’s grace too. They simply say, “I don’t understand, but I need it. Help me.”

 

Yours in Christ,

Rev. Chris Rice

Activities

Yesterday I traveled to Saint Charles, MO for a forum on homelessness at First Methodist Church. We were warmly welcomed, fed a meal, and then treated very kindly. I spoke briefly about the Metro Coalition for the Homeless.
Tonight there is a meeting of the Saint Louis County Council. One of the agenda items regards appropriating money from the Missouri Housing Development Commission for homeless use. I am shuttling homeless people out there and we will be reminding attendees that the current monies spent and system in place are by far inadequate. When someone loses their home in Saint Louis County where do they belong?
On Saturday I’m moderating a Town Hall Meeting for the Homeless at 1411 Locust St. in Saint Louis. This event will give everyone without a fixed residence the opportunity to share their stories. The topics will relate to civil rights, access to housing, violence against the homeless, and life outside in the bitter cold. The Agenda for the meeting involves listening, registering to vote, and signing up members for the Metro Coalition for the Homeless. MCH is a local and regional member of the National Coalition for the Homeless. While this meeting is held at NLEC, it is not a function of NLEC. NLEC is just offering the space.

True Order

“As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever” This prayer uttered again and again in the Daily Lectionary of the Book of Common Prayer reminds me today that the Presence of God is unchanging. God is my grounding. I think of the phrase I utter aloud and to myself, “That’s just the way it has always been” in reference to human nature, to capitalism, to murder, to theft, and to poverty. As though disorder were the only real order there is. I know that I can’t say this to God. Sin is not an order. Sin is rebellion against the real order of things. In praying the prayer I am saying, “God you are all that is really true. I trust not in myself or my church or my city but in You for what is eternal.”
Yesterday I said, “What I want for my birthday is a new mayor in this city, but I don’t think it will happen.” My misguided thoughts place elections within my personal tastes and my tastes in politicians in my list of birthday wishes. In worshiping the Living God I acclaim His eternal order of all things and know that he is accomplishing his will here and now. My desire is poverty of spirit, to mourn, meekness, to hunger and thirst for righteousness, mercy, purity of heart, to make peace, and to be persecuted for righteousness. (Matthew 5)
O Lord let me so hunger and thirst for your righteousness, that in obtaining it I might rejoice in the persecution that results.