Grace, The Beggar's Kingdom

Another quote from Blue Like Jazz, from Chapter 7, Grace, The Beggar's Kingdom: pages 83-85 – "Enlightenment came in an unexpected place: a grocery store. I was on my way over Mount Hood to spend some time in the high desert with a few friends. I was driving alone and decided to stop in at Safeway to pick up some provisions for the weekend.

While standing in line at the checkout counter, the lady in front of me pulled out food stamps to pay for groceries. I had never seen food stamps before. They were more colorful than I imagined and looked more like money than stamps. It was obvious that she unfolded the currency that she, I., and the checkout girl were quite uncomfortable with the interaction. I wish there was something I could do. I wished I could pay for her groceries myself, but to do so would have been to cause a greater scene.



The checkout girl quickly performed her job, signing and verifying a few documents, then filed the lady through the line. The woman never lifted her head as she organized her bags of groceries and set them into her cart. She walked away from the checkout stand in the sort of stiff movements a person uses when they know they're being watched.

On the drive over the mountain that afternoon, I realized that it was not the woman who should be pitied, it was me. Somehow I had come to believe that because a person is in need, they are candidates for sympathy, not just charity. He was not that I wanted to buy her groceries, the government was already doing that. I wanted to buy her dignity. And yet, by judging her, I was the one taking her dignity away.

I wonder what it would be like to use food stamps for a month. I wonder how that would feel, standing in line at the grocery store, pulling from my wallet the bright currency of poverty, feeling the probing eyes of the customers as they studied my clothes and the items in my cart: frozen pizza, and name-brand milk, coffee. I would want to explain to them that I have a good job and make good money.

I love to give to charity, but I don't want to be charity. This is why I have so much trouble with grace. ... It isn't that I want to earn my own way to give something to God, it's that I want to earn my own way so I won't be charity.

As I drove over the mountain that afternoon, realizing I was too proud to receive God's grace, I was humbled. Who am I to think myself above God's charity? And why would I first take the riches of God's righteousness for the dung of my own ego?"

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Miller does a great job pegging himself (and, by extension, us) for his blindness to self-righteousness. Doing our best to be kind, loving people carries an inherent danger of ending up thinking we're all that. Reminds me of one of Jesus' saying in Matthew 5 "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (verse 3) When did faith become this cocky thing about having to be right and prove your point all the time and win every argument?

I had a college prof who taught us that the word for poor here was the Greek word ptochos, poor like a cringing beggar. I can still hear the pity in his voice as he said it.

And we like to always be the benevolent one when often we just need grace. Sometimes we've just got nothing. The beggar's kingdom...seems like good things happen when we stop pretending everything's wonderful and just flat out accept being a charity case. I think if we all figure it out at once there's going to have to be a congressional vote in heaven to increase funding for the charity program. I'm pretty sure the president up there is good for it.