MercyWork

Recovery Advocacy News

ACT NOW! TELL CONGRESS TO SUPPORT the Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007, H.R. 1424!

Representatives Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) and Jim Ramstad (R-MN) have introduced the Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act, a long-overdue bill that aims to end insurance discrimination against people with addiction.

H.R. 1424 would require health plans to end insurance coverage and financial limitations for substance-related disorders and mental illnesses that do not apply to other medical conditions.

Faces & Voices of Recovery urges you to contact your Representative today and ask for their support and co-sponsorship of H.R. 1424. The bill has 253 co-sponsors. Enter your zip code below or click here to see if your US Representative has signed on as a co-sponsor yet.

This bill’s original sponsors are Representatives Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) and Jim Ramstad (R-MN), co-founders and co-chairs of the Congressional Addiction Treatment and Recovery Caucus. H.R.1424’s introduction follows two months of field hearings around the country and is a crucial step toward ending the insurance discrimination faced by too many Americans seeking help and still struggling with addiction to alcohol and other drugs.

Jim Ramstad (R-MN) was a guest on a special Lou Dobbs report last night on CNN. Jim is one of our nations leaders in the recovery advocacy movement. I'll be creating a weekly discussion about discrimination in addiction treatment and the consequences to families.   

Justice and Shalom

Jim Wallis spoke at a recent conference about justice and the poor. I see our recovery work in the context of a kingdom mandate of here and not yet. In this context we are commanded to bring shalom to those in Central Maine.

The story of Luke 14:15-24, the parable of the banquet tells us what God is like, Wallis says.

We tend to blame the poor on one side, or debate the causes of poverty on the other. Jesus points to something different: inviting them in. It's about a welcome table.

It's about inclusion, bringing people into community with us and incorporating their needs with ours. Poverty is resolved by bringing people into community and relationship.

It's also about justice. The Hebrew prophets are especially hard on those who oppress the poor. The God of the BIble is not a God of charity; he is a God of justice who holds kings and rulers and judges and employers responsible for how they treat widows, orphans, and workers about issues of land, labor, and capital. That too is rooted in a vision of right relationships.

Rick Warren has said that he's discovered the 2,000 verses about the poor. Wallis says that he knows what he means. Our Bibles have holes, and we've neglected entire sections. We're now putting our Bibles back together again. We can't say we believe the Bible unless we believe all of it.

A couple of kids heard Wallis talking about some facts: a six-year-old who ways 17 pounds, the 30,000+ children who die each day from lack of water, food, and curable diseases. There's a silent tsunami killing people every day.

One of the kids said, "How come? Don't people know?" We know, but there are some reasons:

1. The poor aren't a priority. 800 million kids never go to school. The issue isn't money. It would take 5 weeks of Iraq. This won't change unless we bring the poor into community.

2. We have a debate over strategy. The issues are complex, and it's easier to debate them than to work on outcomes.

3. The issue is relationship. The facts of global poverty won't change until they become personal to us. When they become personal, it will change us and it will change the facts about poverty.

Bono went to Ethiopia as a young man. Someone handed him a child for a photo op, as happens often with rock stars. After, Bono handed the child back. The father said, "No, please take him. He will die if he stays with me." That changed Bono.

Bono spoke at the prayer breakfast. He said that God is with us when we are with the poor. He didn't say that God is with us when we are for the poor; it's when we are actually with the poor.

Isaiah 65 describes what God hates and God loves. This isn't a prophesy of heaven; this is God's vision and aim for human and institutional relationships. Those who ignore God and his issues are destined for poverty. On the other hand, God is creating a world of justice, joy, and hope. He invites us to join in. It will affect life spans, will allow people to enjoy the fruit of their labor, and will result in peace.

This isn't a utopian dream. A similar vision is in Micah 4:1-5. Peace and security are a result of just living.

I wrote recently about our friends Rodney and Cindy LaFrance and the work in Costa Rica. Cindy’s father Fred went on to be with the Lord over the weekend. I spoke with Cindy yesterday and the family is well and grateful for a life well lived. The memorial service will be at the McFalls Vineyard Wednesday night starting at 6:30. Rodney arrived from Costa Rica last night. These guys are old, dear friends of Deborah and I. Way back in 1978 we built a Log Church together. Amazing days of grace, gifting and confusion! It is a story worth telling in the near future. Please pray for the LaFrances as they gather to celebrate and mourn there father, grandfather and great-grandfather, husband, brother and friend. I remember Fred as a man of quiet dignity and grace.

MercyWalk

Our mercy/prayer walk was a blessed event. 20+ gathered in front of the City Hall building in Lewiston. We read scripture and then started out. I felt as though we should pray to notice what God notices in the community. We all prayed that God would break our hearts with the things that break his. We walked by the new skatepark and talked a bit about youth culture and then prayed. We spent time at Trinity Church, HeadStart, B Street Clinic, Root Cellar and prayed at each location. Gloria Sites was struck by the number of windows (seemly everywhere) with no curtains. She mentioned that they looked like vacant eyes...sort of watching. We prayed for those living behind those windows. We gathered at the Food Pantry to debrief. Joyce Gagnon talked about the work there and our continued commitment to neighborhood priorities. Charity had a great word picture of God hovering over the community waiting and protecting. Matt. spoke of the work that's been done and the assurance of God's protection. All in all we went away with a deeper understanding of what Missional community is. We will commit the month of April to prayer and fasting and ask God to show us his continued heart. One sister spoke of hope and I was reminded of this quote...

"One of the core aspects of poverty is not a lack of money but a lack of hope -- lack of a dream. One of the core tasks of leadership, therefore, is to help the community to dream again. Part of this task is "the management of meaning... It is this capacity to articulate a preferred future based on a common moral vision that allows people to dream again.."

the rule of prayer is the rule of faith.

lex orandi; lex redendi; est.

Our friends Rodney and Cindy Lafrance updated thier newletter regarding the work in Costa Rica. The house is coming along well and is slowly being furnished. They are working in Anonos one of the poorer barrio's in the region. A recent trip brought them into the house of a young woman who is addicted to crack. To qoute Cindy " She is a very pretty young
woman, who has very sad eyes and I could say that she
even has a sad smile.  She is very thin and in need of
clothing.  Her home sits on the side of the river.  It
has simple, corrugated metal walls and roof and a dirt
floor.  On the inside is only wooden framing with no
walls.  Her floor slants towards the river.  It is
probably the worst and the dirtiest home that I've
seen since coming here. Her name is Ruth. Let's  pray for her at every opportunity we can. Also, lets pray for the LaFrances that God would continue to break their hearts (and ours) with the things that break his.

A prayer: Meciful Father, in our day today we ask that you would invade our thoughts with the things you notice. Help those addicted today to encounter you. Give us the vision to see beyond the tyranny of addiction and we pray that your kingdom would shatter the reality of despair and bring enslaved people into your presence and freedom in Jesus name Amen.

Cindy quoted Oswald Chambers in the newsletter. It's interesting because I mentioned OC in a recent sermon. Yesterday in church a woman stopped me to say she had a similair experience in the early Jesus Movement days of running around with a old bible and a copy of My Upmost for his Highest. Here's the quote:

"It is easier to serve God without a vision, easier to
work for God without a call, because then you are not
bothered by what God requires; common sense is your
guide, veneered over with Christian sentiment.  You
will be more prosperous and successful, more
leisure-hearted, if you never realize the call of God.
But if once you receive a commission from Jesus
Christ, the memory of what God wants will always come
like a goad; you will no longer be able to work for
Him on the common sense-basis. ......Practical work
may be a competitor against abandonment to God,
because practical work is based on this
argument--Remember how useful you are here, or--Think
how much value you would be in that particular type of
work.  That attitude does not put Jesus Christ as the
Guide as to where we should go, but our judgment as to
where we are of most use.  Never consider whether you
are of use; but ever consider that you are not your
own but His."
Some of us are going to the Invisible Children screening at Bates College tonight. It's at the mays silo building starting at 7:00.   

On the Town

EchoKalos planning meeting went well at our house Monday night. Good food and community. There really is something about a meal together. Fit's in to the idea of a praxis of hospitality. Teams are being formed for our small groups and there appears to be an overall spirit of vision and hope. Dr. Kelleys lecture was well recieved with about 50 attending. He walked everyone through the brains response to using alcohol and drugs. It really is a brain disease. Folks had some good questions and the response has been incredible. Speaking of incredible, I facilitated the memorial service for Victor Williams on thursday evening. Victor was a recovering guy (6 years) who passed last saturday. A 100 people in recovery showed up to honor his life. Many stood up to share how Victor touched their lives. Powerful, compeling words of grace and dignity. I was stunned by the sense of community there. It was a storytellers evening. Men and women standing to share their own experience, strength and hope. Victor reached 100's of people with his smile and his love for God. Kim and Jay Levesque along with Jill Lebel sang "under the shadow" at the request of Victors mother Jo. It set the table for the sharing time. I loved being apart of it. Victor would attend an AA meeting and when they prayed the Our Father at the end he would lift his face to heaven and smile. We closed the service with praying and looking up to heaven and thanking God for this jewel of a man people came to know as Vic.

repentance

If, this Ash Wednesday, you do not feel worthy to carry the blessing of the one who is all love and justice and hope make a sign of the cross on your hand with the ashes.

Carry the mark with you today as a reminder that your worthiness is never part of God's equation.

like these words. AW was nearly two weeks ago and still these words resonate with me. It speaks to redesribing the threatening idea of alienation from God. It also speaks powerfully to God being present in our lives. As Jesus walks to his destiny at Calvary the shadow of others things attempt to occupy our time. Nothing is more relevant then the journey that Jesus has called us to. Nothing more compeling then the thought that God is at work powerfully in crafting the redemptive narrative for our lives.

Second Sunday in Lent

O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all who have gone astry from thy ways, and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of thy Word, Jesus Christ thy Son; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Preface of Lent

blankets for kids update

The snow storm cancelled the outreach for Blankets for kids. We've changed the date to 3.6.07 at the same location. If you happen through the lobby of our church Sunday check out our mercyWork table. We have alot happening as we move into spring. We're excited about hosting our first immigrant walk 4.21.07. We'll start at the old train yard where French Canadian immigrants first arrived in Lewiston. We'll look at "Little Canada" and how entire neighborhoods were built around schools and churchs. So...stop by and say hi sunday. I thought of having a cookie sale. One large oatmeal raisin for $2,500.00. Delusion has its benefits.