A Glimmer of God’s Glory

Poverty, at its core, is disconnection. It is being disconnected from relationships and resources, which are the wellspring of wealth and life — material and spiritual, external and internal, temporal and eternal. We see poverty in both its breadth and depth. The breadth of poverty is determined by how many disconnects there are, and its depth by the distance between those disconnects.

The culture of generational poverty is marked by a profound depth and breadth of poverty. As ministers of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:11-21), we are called, first, through the gospel, to reconcile people back to God (life eternal), and, second, to reconcile them back to all of His resources intended for human flourishing (life abundant).

Due to the depth and breadth of the disconnects, the reconciliation and reconnection process is usually slow and incremental. Having served in this cultural context for the last 25 years, we measure progress in inches per year, not miles per hour. Slowly, over generations, we see change and growth, healing and hope, productivity and progress. We rejoice in steps forward and lament the steps backward.

Sometimes, we catch a glimmer of God’s glory in our cultural context — acts of sacrifice and service that put the more privileged among us to shame.

Loved by the Father and His Children

We met Charlene about 15 years ago. We would see her wandering the streets with a detached zombie-like expression. Her facial features were so bony, and her body so skeletal, I was not sure that she was a woman until we started speaking to one another. I began to greet her at every opportunity in a genuine, warm, and enthusiastic way. 

At first, she was distant and apathetic, but she eventually warmed up. Over time, we had the joy of sharing Christ with her. She eventually confessed her faith in Him and was baptized. She became a much-loved member of our River City Church family, beginning her journey of healing, recovery, and transformation.

We learned more of her story: decades of crack addiction, prostitution, HIV/AIDS, serious health and dental problems, toxic and violent family dynamics, being raped as a child, dropping out of school, repeated stints in jail and prison. Through the years, we’ve helped her get into more than a dozen rehabs. 

She had been living clean and sober for many months, only to fall back into her addiction. She’s now a couple of months clean, living in Fort Smith, away from the people, places, and things that trigger her addiction. Through all the twists and turns, she knows she is loved by her Heavenly Father and by her church family. That knowledge has never left her.

God’s Kingdom in Hard Places

In 1998, when Charee was 9 years old, my wife, Laura, began mentoring her. We developed a lifelong bond of love and friendship with her and her family. Charee grew up in generational poverty, with a mother who struggled with a crack addiction. Charee was often left to care for and raise her four younger siblings. 

As she moved into adulthood, there were some seasons of disconnect from the Lord and us. But upon reaching a low point — falling into homelessness in 2019, with two adolescent children — she came to live with us for a short time, until she transitioned into Hand Up Housing, our transitional and transformational housing ministry. 

A few years later, she transitioned into her own home with the help of a social worker at River City Ministry, where she also received some medical and dental assistance. She found work as a home health provider. She and her teen children are now active members of our church family. I am now mentoring her 17-year-old son in the same youth mentoring ministry through which we met her 28 years ago. He’s a disciple of Jesus and is growing as a leader in our church family.

Just last week, Charee kept vigil with her dying patient. She combed her hair, made her comfortable, and shared words of comfort from her faith in Jesus. All on her own time, off the clock for a woman who herself struggles to make ends meet.

This is what the kingdom looks like in the hard places, and it is available to all of us who are willing to show up.

Being a Minister of Reconciliation

We all can make our own contributions to the reconnection process. Here are some ways you can do so:

• Pray! Pray for open hearts, open minds, and open lives. Pray for comfort, healing, strength, and hope. Pray for workers. Pray for doors of opportunity to open.
• See the poor, the homeless, the panhandlers, the disadvantaged, the addicted, and the profoundly dysfunctional through the eyes of Jesus. Learn from John 9 how to see people as Jesus saw the blind man, rather than how everyone else saw him.
• Exude warmth, grace, love, and exuberance when encountering the disadvantaged. Make eye contact, smile, and speak graciously.
• Pursue genuine relationships with those in need, and provide vocational training and employment opportunities. Take risks out of reverence for Christ.
• Support ministries, youth mentoring programs, and Christian youth camps that are making a difference in this setting.

We are each called to be God’s ministers of reconnection — partnering with Him and one another — to help make, by His grace, one connection at a time. 

Let us be found faithful in this Kingdom enterprise.