Latest / Welcome Home. Here, Us, Now. / Gospel-Rooted Help with Tom De Vries -- Episode 1

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Gospel-Rooted Help with Tom De Vries -- Episode 1 · Welcome Home. Here, Us, Now.

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome home, Hear Us Now, a podcast of the Union Gospel Mission of Tarrant County, a space for all of us seeking what's real and sacred in a world that rushes past the soul.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_03: Eric Engelman here in the green room.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_03: And next to me is Father Rogers Meredith.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_03: And also I have Tom DeVries with us.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm looking at Father Rogers Meredith.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_03: How are you doing?
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm well, thank you.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_03: Waiting for it to rain.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, well, it rained at my place last night.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: Um now by the I don't know if it'll be news by the time we actually produce this and and publish it, but uh yeah, we got some rain last night, and that's and it did not reach 100 degrees.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_03: That's good.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_03: Um, today it might not even reach ninety-five.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: Looks like uh summer's over.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_03: Aw darn.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's inescapable the earth is tilting away from the sun.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: Something's gotta happen.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you, God.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_03: Father Rogers Meredith is the head chaplain here at Union Gospel Mission in Tarrant County.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a senior chaplain, yeah.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: Senior chaplain.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_03: Across the table from us is Tom DeVries from Citigate Network.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_03: You are the CEO, right?
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: President CEO of Citigate Network, yes.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_03: And you're you're in town for a conference.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_03: Great to be able to have a conversation.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_03: All right, you get a little applause here.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for the affirmation.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: So how are you doing?
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Doing well.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: It is great to be here.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: We have probably almost a hundred people from our missions in the Rawhide District, which is Texas and Oklahoma and Arkansas.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's great to be able to just encourage them and talk about ministry and what that looks like and uh recognize the difference that they're all making in this region.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's great.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_03: These are not just homeless shelters, these are other organizations that have a common vision of touching lives, transforming lives in Jesus' name.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: I I talk about serving the the same population, and uh whether it's homelessness, addiction, poverty, uh, and be belie being able to share the love of Christ.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it's really great to be a part of a movement like that.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_03: The title of our podcast is Welcome Home Hear Us Now.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: We play uh we we spell here H E R E, but uh there's also the H E A R here that uh we like and and just spending time catching up, even maybe having a little bit of a reflective conversation.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: What do you see around here that makes you feel at home?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Feel feel at home.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: I I think the first thing was just uh driving down the street as I was coming up to UGM Tarrant County and uh seeing all of the people that uh are really part of uh who this ministry serves, uh, and to see them outside, to see them carrying in some cases all that they own in the world, uh and to be able to have a place that says, you're welcome here, and this can be your home too.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and to know that we have well over 330 missions around the U.S., Canada, and Caribbean uh where that's a similar site with similar people who need a similar message and similar open arms.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um sounds like you're at home here then.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh very much so.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_03: Now you've you've been around too.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_03: I've I've I've read an article, I think, uh that at one time you were church planting in South America.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so the Southern California at least, and uh certainly we've planted churches in uh South America as well, and uh was part of a denomination where I oversaw the church multiplication movement and revitalization movement uh in being able to start churches in contexts um that were really there for the people who um may not have a relationship with Christ or not been familiar with the gospel.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh where we planted about 60 miles east of LA, we found a lot of folks were coming out of uh divorces uh and bankruptcy um or their own addictions.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: And they needed to be able to find places where they could be accepted, uh especially in a church, and to be able to provide a community for them where they we would say, you're welcome here.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was really a wonderful ministry.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_03: Neat.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_03: Do you have a question you want to ask?
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: Where are you from, I guess, is one question.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so um so so home today is Colorado Springs, Colorado.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's where the offices are for City Gate Network and have been for a uh a period of time.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um was born in Red Rapids, Michigan.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, and uh lived there all of 14 months, and then we moved to Southern California.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: My dad was actually a pastor, so I'm a pastor's kid and uh ended up uh being in Southern Cal California for uh a long period of time, uh, ended up at Wheaton College, Fuller Seminary.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: When were you at Wheaton?
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was at Wheaton, uh it would have been like uh early 80s.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: And then uh went to Fuller and got my Master of Divinity, spent a year at Talbot Seminary as well, and got my doctor of ministry from Western Seminary up in Portland, Oregon.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so spent some time pastoring then in West Michigan at a larger church that uh had five sites, and uh then also was in Chicago as uh president CEO of the Global Leadership Network, where we uh put on the Global Leadership Summit.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_03: Neat.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_03: Well you mentioned Oregon, and uh I I'm a fighting duck.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's great.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: My son still lives in Bend, so over the month he would understand exactly what that is.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: I pastored on the the western slope for seven years, yeah.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh wonderful.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's Colorado Springs has a lot of ministries in it.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: It does.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people have their headquarters there.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: They do.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I wonder why that is.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it it goes back, I think, to roots, obviously, with the navigators in young life back in the forties and fifties.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and many other ministries like Compassion and Focus on the Family and City Gate.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, all uh ended up migrating that direction, and that's been great.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: And uh your Mary Yemy uh was a church planter himself, uh who's the current mayor of Colorado Springs and a great Christ follower and good friend.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_03: Well may uh may Jesus use that.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_03: Continue to use that.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_03: My rector from a church that I attended became the senior chaplain here at Union Gospel Mission for a few years.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_03: Father Renikus?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_03: Or after that.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, Father Andy.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, okay.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_03: I'm told that he had a saying that his his job was to make sure to keep Union Gospel Mission in Tarrant County Christian just because of all of the other diversions, the other the other things that uh that might come up.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_03: How would you recommend that people here stay Christian?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: What are your thoughts on that?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: Especially in light of pardon me for interrupting.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, that's fine.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: You have the social services side and you have the Christian service side.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: There certainly is some overlap there, but the way the wind tends to blow is one way or the other.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: And if if it goes one way and it goes too far, obviously, if you're in this kind of work, you know where that goes.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's kind of what I think, just to elucidate a little bit what he's getting at.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: No, and and I think it's it's great to be able to have uh uh a historical perspective and rootedness in understanding who you are.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I love our story.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: So in May, uh I actually was in Glasgow, Scotland, uh, and we were celebrating the beginning of the first city mission or rescue mission in Glasgow, uh, started by David Naismith in 1826.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and it was great to be with Christians from Europe and the UK, from South Africa and around the world who share a similar heart and passion uh and centeredness around the gospel.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that kind of came to our side of the pond in 1872 with Jerry Macaulay, uh, who started the first uh rescue mission in New York City.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: And uh uh 316 Water Street was actually where it was started.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: And Jerry had come out of prison, he'd had a conversion experience there himself, and he realized that there needed to be ministry to those um men who had been incarcerated and now were on the street and had no place to go.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and he started a city mission or rescue mission that way that uh ultimately uh in 1906 we started as the uh International Union of Gospel Missions, uh, which then became the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions, and then uh we changed the City Gate Network in uh 2018.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but it's really been the same group, uh all rooted in the gospel, recognizing that it's the power of the gospel to change lives.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: Our then CEO, I'm sorry.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, our then CEO was at that conference you're talking about in Glasgow.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yeah.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: So uh Charles Wolford was there, and it was great to spend time with Charles and Bruce Butler also from uh UGM Dallas uh was a part of that gathering, and uh a number of uh CEOs from ministries here uh were able to go and not just represent, uh, but I think share their stories uh of how what was started 200 years ago remains today and the rootedness of the the gospel around that.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so I look at the stories then that come out of that history that um really were a part of the revival movement uh in American history, the revivalist movement that was D.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: L.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Moody and tent meetings.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh one of my favorite stories was really Billy Sunday, the uh great baseball player who became uh evangelist.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I can uh the the the origin story of the mission, City Mission in Newcastle, Pennsylvania, uh came out of a revival that Billy Sunday did there, where um over 10,000 people attended over a third four to six week period, thirty-day period.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and in a big tent, 7,000 people came to Christ.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: On the last night of uh the revival, he took an offering, he handed it to the city leaders, and he said, Take this offering and start a rescue mission.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the start.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it came out of that crusade, it came out of that uh revival, and that's where our roots are.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: They really are, and it it's unique as you look and say, Do we go a uh more of a uh social work, compassion uh direction, or do we really stay rooted in the gospel?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's unique about our movement uh is that we still look and see the gospel is central uh to the message that we share, that transformation comes through Jesus Christ and what Jesus Christ did on the cross for us.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, in an amazing way to say the love of Christ is really what compels us, right?
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: The Apostle Paul said that, and that ultimately then we share that love uh with people around us, people that are living rough, people living on the streets, and saying, how can we then in a tangible way uh share Christ's love?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really how our missions and ministries have started uh and continued over so many years, was really out of that compelling love of Christ to put love in action in some way.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And how then we look and say, okay, so how does that that continue?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it really is staying rooted in that same faith and saying that it it certainly is about what we do, but it's really grounded in who we are as followers of Jesus, uh, and making sure that that's central to what we're about.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: So what we do definitely follows who we are.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, not we do this and because you can get the heart before the cart before the horse sometimes.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: I I'll I appreciate that quite a bit.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that is key.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: There's always a tendency to want to innovate and do new things, which is not necessarily bad.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um but if you look at me and you see how I'm dressed, uh you you might come you might think, well, this is a person that has an appreciation of tradition.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: And and I do, and I think that that is absolutely key to the survival of Christianity.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: The church, if you talk about the survival, the continuance of Christianity in the West, is gonna be because we stayed where we always have been.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: We're that one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: We have moved from that, from the rock that we're founded on.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's really, I think, the the the central theme or connection for ministries and missions that are that are part of City Gate Network, and that is that we have uh an Orthodox statement uh of faith uh that every one of our missions is committed to.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Their board and leadership have agreed to, uh, and we center around that and are able to live it out together.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_03: This is good stuff.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_03: I'm recognizing the need for what is called in the scriptures the fear of the Lord.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all's thoughts?
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: Fear being respect.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I think you'd you look at scripture and recognize that it talks about fearing the Lord, that that's the beginning of wisdom.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: That we're to fear God and keep his commandments, right?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: One of those would certainly be that Jesus gave to us, love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Love your neighbor as yourself.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and recognizing really the the the integration of that, that it really isn't three different loves, it's really one.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: Loving God causes us to love others, and it's connected to how we love ourselves.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there's the idea that you love God in an unself-concerned manner.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, you love God because of who he is, not because you're worried about going to hell.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's self-interest, right?
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: You love God in a self-interested manner.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: So my question as I thought about this, I'm like, well, how do you how do you love God like that in a non-self-interested way, right?
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: And where I'm at right now, I've been thinking about this for a couple days, is the way you love God, the way you get to the point where you can love God in a in a way that's not full of self-interest, is that you love other people.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: But by loving other people in a selfless way, you can come to the place where you love God in a selfless way.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Probably not perfectly, but you know, it depends on where you're at on a certain other theological issues.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that that's a way that you do that, and that certainly comes into what we do, because we love people not in a transactional way, not as a transaction, but because of who they are made in God's image and who we want to be and who we are, if that makes sense.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I think it comes in the deepening of that uh relationship and that intimacy that we have got with God, that as we understand who God is, we understand um what God loves.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that out of maybe even we maybe there are things maybe in a marital relationship or in a friendship, right?
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Where when we begin to deepen the intimacy of that relationship, we can begin to love the things that that friend or that spouse uh loves as well.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the same with God that uh as we look at the Imago Day, the recogn recognizing that the image of God is in each person uh and that God loves each person, that we're able, out of our relationship and understanding of God, to be able to share that love as well and love those people just as you shared, Father.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_03: Aaron Ross Powell Amen.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_03: I'm told you have some really good stories.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I've if you've been walking any of this out for any length of time, I'm pretty sure you do.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_03: Um say do you have some some stories about lives uh that you've seen changed in the United States or out of the United States that that are in response to this kind of love, this kind of fear of the Lord?
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: I remember the the f one of the first encounters I had um as I stepped into my role with Citigate Network, and I went and visited uh Union Rescue Mission in Los Angeles, which is right on Skid Row.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we actually have two missions within a block of each other uh on Skid Row, and probably within less than a mile um square one square mile, there are uh probably somewhere around seven to ten thousand people that are experiencing uh homelessness in in that community.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: And our again, our ministries have been there for over a hundred years, uh and they've reached out to the people that are in very desperate and despairing kinds of situations.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I I walked into that mission, and um I the first person I met was a young woman, and she said, I'm leaving today.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I looked at her and I and I said, Tell me more, right?
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, what uh what what is that?
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: You're here.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: And and she said, I have lived here for five years and I finally am moving into my own apartment today.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's cool.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: And she shared her story of addiction, of being able to connect to uh Union Rescue Mission there in Los Angeles, uh, of being able to overcome that addiction through discipleship, through uh God's word, through relationship and community in that mission.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that led her on to staff, actually.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And she became a part of that staff and as she had been uh found community, found freedom, uh, and ultimately was moving out into uh her own place af as the next step in her journey.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it was great to see the transformation take place.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it goes to exactly her relationship with Christ and the ministry of that mission and being with people that loved her.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: Well, this is a good place to plan to uh to quit the first episode.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_03: Um I was uh I'm looking at Father Roger's Meredith and uh want to see if he could close us out in some prayer.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: In the name of the Father and the Son and Holy Ghost, I'm in.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: Father, hear us now as we pray in the way in which your son taught us to pray.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: What he taught us to pray saying, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, now and forever.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.