September 10, 2009 marks the day headlines across the country and a few abroad revealed this: U.S. poverty rate hits 11-year high.

 

While several news sources posted the story I’ve chosen Reuters to share if you’d like to read the article here. 

 

Poverty stinks from every angle. It challenges personal esteem, often times deflating it. It challenges relationships, often times breaking them. It crushes dreams and snuffs out hope.  It’s suffocating, it’s exhausting, and it’s awful.

 

A few years ago I worked for an accredited Non-profit organization that was run by the church that employed me. This organization sought to bring life transformation to families residing in local motels. Motel life is generational. If you were a kid growing up living in a motel, odds are you are raising your kids in a motel today. In 2002, when I first began with this organization, there were an estimated 250 families living in motels in one city.

 

I worked with 1 motel primarily. My job was to build relationships with the families. I needed to spend a lot of time at the motel to do this. Over time, as trust began to develop, I was invited in a few of the rooms. The kitchen consists of 1 hot plate about 3 inches in diameter. The fortunate families had ice coolers to keep food cold. Entire families shared 1 room, 1 bed. You can imagine all the issues that arise from living under such conditions. Issues like, malnutrition, low self esteem, self hatred, children sexualized at a young age, children unable to have a place to do school work, etc.

 

My job was to assist these families by providing the means to help them start over and leave behind motel living. There were after school programs put in place where people from the church would volunteer to help the children do their school work. Classes were taught on basic life skills for the adults. Field trips were held for the kids to expose them to life outside the motel. Buses were provided so entire families could attend bonfires at the beach together. A host of activities were always in place to help these families out of motel life and to ending their cycle of poverty.

 

These programs helped tremendously. But I’ve got to be honest, the thing that helped these families the most leave behind their state of poverty, was the personal interaction they received from church volunteers. The relationships that were formed between the rich and the poor were the driving force in ending the poverty. The consistency of having people step inside their world at the motel and show care, concern and love for them, is what truly brought the transformation. Sound familiar? That’s exactly what Jesus Christ has done for us.

 

I read the article mentioned above and my first reaction was sorrow. My second reaction was one of excitement. We, and by we I mean the Church, have a responsibility to care for the poor. I was reminded of the great joy that I witnessed in those families who did make it out of the motel and out of poverty. The joy they bring is contagious and some of the very people who were once the needy are now those who are going back and making sure that others in the motel have the opportunity to end their cycle of poverty as well.

 

We, the Church, have a great opportunity here. Jesus Christ came to heal the sick and feed the poor. We have, not only the responsibility, but also the great privilege and challenge of participating in Christ’s great work. And there is plenty of work to do. I do not believe we are asked to depend on our government or on any one person or organization to fix the US problem of poverty. I do believe, however, the Church can depend on the One who has served us, healed us and transformed us, to help do the same for our nations poor.  

 

Many of you are part of churches and/or organizations that are doing this great work already. What have you seen work to help the needy in your communities? What are some ideas that come to mind for ways we can stand up and serve the growing number of impoverished in our communities?  Let’s share some ways we can work together to help bring restoration, health and life to our local poor and needy.