The Ministries at Main Street

Scriptural Understanding and Our Calling TO BE the Church

Mission Statement

            We, the Ministries at Main Street call the church to BE THE CHURCH, caring for the poor as Jesus the Christ has instructed us:

V   "If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." (Matthew 19:21)

V    "You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." (Mark 10:21b)

V   "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous." (Luke 14:12-14)

V   "Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." (Luke 18:22b)

V   " In the Sermon on the Plain, Luke tells us what Jesus says, "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." (Luke 6:20b)

We take a cue from Jesus, who often rephrased the law in order to broaden its interpretation, as we rephrase this final passage, from Luke 6:20b "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God" to say, "All you who are poor, you are a blessing to us, and we are called to be a blessing to you."

In Paul's Letter to the Galatians, Chapter 2, he writes that once the Galatians realized his faithfulness, "They asked only one thing, that we remember the poor, which was actually what I was eager to do." (Galatians 2:10)

And the prophets spoke to this very thing thousands of years ago. Isaiah, offering us just one of nearly 3000 biblical references of how we are to honor the poor, when he writes what the Lord had said in confronting the people with their failed vision of what fasting was. He writes:

Will you call this a fast,

a day acceptable to the LORD?

Is not this the fast that I choose:

to loose the bonds of injustice,

to undo the thongs of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,

and to break every yoke?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,

and bring the homeless poor into your house;

when you see the naked, to cover them,

and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,

and your healing shall spring up quickly;

your vindicator shall go before you,

the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer;

you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. (Isaiah 58:5c-9)

And ironically, with all of the debate within the churches about homosexuality, the real sin of Sodom had nothing to do with sex, but rather "This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy." (Ezekiel 16:49)

Finally, the prophet Zechariah wrote the word of the Lord that came to him, "Thus says the LORD of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another." (Zechariah 7:9-10)

And so:

We, the Ministries at Main Street, have been called and sent to be the light of the world on behalf of Jesus the Christ. We shine that light in the direction of all who are without permanent places to live, inviting them to come and be fed and offered a bed.