I found God last night. He lives among the homeless in Nashville. At least that’s where He was on Tuesday evening.
There’s a beautiful organization called The Bridge Ministry, started by gospel singer Candy Christmas (yes, that’s her real name), to take care of the homeless. Every Tuesday night, up to 500 people show up for a hot meal and a church service, literally under a bridge in downtown Nashville. Last night, the choir from my church that I sing in, Christ Church, was part of the service.
I’m going to be honest — I didn’t want to go. I had a lot of reasons not to go: leaving for vacation, work to get caught up on, laundry to do, and on and on. And, I didn’t really want to spend my evening out in the oppressive heat with a bunch of homeless people.
But guess what I found out? God is among the homeless.
Truthfully, I have my battled my own prejudices over the years, with homeless people. Surely they have made some poor choices that got them where they are, right? Surely if they wanted to, they could get a job, right? Surely I’ve made better decisions than they, and I’ve earned everything I have, right?
Not exactly.
My sister-in-law, Tracy, and I were talking on the way home about how fortunate we are to have been born in the circumstances we were. We were both born into families of hard workers, who understand the value of a dollar.
What if I had been born into the cycle of poverty? What if all I knew was living paycheck to paycheck, spending my money on cigarettes and convenience food, and that’s all I knew, and what everyone around me did? What if I thought living in the projects was normal?
The counter-argument to that, of course, is that there are so many programs to teach job skills, money management, etc., and that’s true. There are, and help is readily available.
And, there are plenty of people who could work, and choose not to, and that statement is also true. On almost any street corner, you can find someone standing with a sign, asking for a hand-out, or maybe selling The Contributor (also known as the homeless newspaper) for a dollar.
But last night, as I watched the few hundred gathered, eating a hot meal while listening to the music and a short sermon, I realized these people are just like me. Their reasons for being homeless are complicated and varied, I’m certain. Addiction. Mental illness. Poor choices. Job loss. Crime.
Yet I became convinced that it’s among these people: the homeless, the destitute, the broken, where we find Jesus. Maybe we don’t go to our clean, air-conditioned church to find Him. Maybe that’s where He finds us, because it’s the space and the place where we set aside our busy schedules for a couple hours and still ourselves. But maybe if we need to find Him, we need to go to the outcasts, the forgotten ones, the ones society has deemed less than.
Isn’t that what He did? Didn’t he go to those marginalized? The tax collectors? The adulterers? The sinners?
“And it happened that He was reclining at the table in his house, and many tax collectors and sinners were dining with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many of them, and they were following Him. When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that He was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they said to His disciples, ‘Why is He eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners?’ And hearing this, Jesus said to them, ‘It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.'” Mark 2:15 – 17
He didn’t send a check. He didn’t make a donation. He didn’t hand them a $5 bill as He walked away from them. He hung out with them. He broke bread with them. He invited them into His home. He became one with them. He met them in their need.
I think a modern-day version of that verse would be, “And it happened that He was reclining at the table in his house, and many addicts and prostitutes and sinners were dining with Jesus and His disciples …”
So why do we stay away? Why do I stay away?
Because it makes me uncomfortable. I’d rather pretend they ‘deserve’ their lot in life because of their own choices.
If only that was true.
I don’t know what it’s like to battle a mental illness. I didn’t become an alcoholic after taking my first sip of alcohol. I’ve never been around, or interested in, drugs of any kind. I have access to financial help, should I need it.
I’m fortunate, for certain, but I certainly can’t pat myself on the back and commend myself on all my good choices. I’ve consumed way more than my fair share of grace and mercy.
Maybe that’s where the rub is for me: I fully and completely and with reckless abandon enjoy the unmerited grace and favor that has covered my life. Maybe I haven’t battled what the people under the bridge have battled, but I’ve made (more than) my fair share of mistakes. Yet here I am, in a house, with a family. I own a car, I have food in my house, and far, far more clothes than I need.
So why do I embrace the mercy and grace in my life, while looking at the man on the street corner and assume he should get justice for his sins?
How audacious of me to assume his justice, but my mercy, are both fair.
Loving the poor, the destitute, the outcast is the message of the gospel, and the message of Jesus. He practically spells it out for us in Matthew 25.
“For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’” (v. 35, 36)
Of course, there is a flip side to that verse too, when we don’t help the hungry, the thirsty, the imprisoned. And He can’t make it any clearer when He says, “I tell you the truth, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me.” (v.45)
Maybe most of the people were under the bridge last night because of their own choices. And maybe that doesn’t matter.
If we assume that the homeless are homeless, and the destitute are destitute, and the broken are broken because of their own choices — their own fault, if you will — then the entire message of the gospel is lost on us. We cannot — I cannot — embrace grace and mercy in my life, and not assume they deserve the same.
“Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” (John 8:7b)
I found God last night. He was with the homeless, under a bridge, in Nashville.
