Once the Relief Bus is loaded down with soup, socks, and supplies, the volunteers have been assigned to their respective vehicles, and the last echo of our battle cry has been dispersed into the air, we climb aboard and drive as efficiently as traffic will allow to our destinations. It usually takes about an hour to get from our base in Elizabeth, NJ to our outreach locations in NYC. And during that time we participate in something that has fueled our organization since our birth in 1989: worship.
As our NYC Outreach Director, Johanna Soukka, likes to say: “we’ve prepared the soup. We’ve prepared the buses. Now, it’s time for us to prepare ourselves.”
It’s not complicated.
We simply invite our volunteers to silence their cell phones, as well as their private conversations, and allow the worship music from the Relief Bus sound system to usher them into the Holy of Holies. This time is sacred and it makes all the difference in the world. I’m convinced that we serve a God who indwells the musical worship of his people. I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it. There’s nothing like it. I’m also convinced that this same God bleeds for the needs of his children who suffer in financial distress, homelessness, and poverty.
When we combine the worship of God’s people with humble service to the poor, we heat heavenly fuel and oxygen and explode with the power of Spiritual Combustion.
God has been trying to enlighten His people to this chemical cocktail since He made the Jewish temple the center of both sacrifice and service over 3,000 years ago. The people of God would go to the temple to atone for their sins, as well as give generously, so that those in poverty would have their needs met. In fact whenever the Israelites rejected the poor, God would reject their worship. In Amos 5:21-24 God calls His people out for missing this point:
“I hate, I despise your religious festivals; your assemblies are a stench to me. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!”
Like heat combined with oxygen and fuel, when the people of God lift up the name of Jesus while simultaneously lifting up the heads of those struggling with financial poverty and hopelessness, we experience the fire of God like nothing else.
If your only act of worship to God is singing songs of praise and you haven’t made time or space to engage and serve the poor, then you are missing part of the equation. If you volunteer your time and serve food to folks who are hungry, but you don’t build in worship and praise to God who made both the rich and the poor, then you are only half way there.
God wants you to experience the fire of His presence. Serving the poor as an act of worship is what He desires for you to experience the fullness of his power. He is the Great Chemist inviting us to bring the necessary components to spark a revolution of love and restoration in our cities, our streets, and our homes. There’s a reason we always worship on our way to serve our friends living in the street. We aren’t simply killing time or gathering our thoughts. We aren’t simply enjoying the music or mandating behavioral compliance.
We are stoking the fire! We are engaging in the single most effective strategy for organizational longevity and life transformation: Spiritual Combustion.
