At one time the largest livestock exchange property west of the Mississippi River handling millions of dollars of transactions a year and even rivaled the famed Chicago (live)stock exchange for volume of livestock and money to be made, this monstrous building stood as a beacon for wealth for the South Side of St. Joseph, Missouri. Not only did this Livestock Exchange Building (a large four-story red brick and stone building built in 1898-1899) housed offices for lawyers, bankers, investors, and auctions running year round for wheeling and dealing (the buying and trading, and at one time considered the largest livestock gateway to send livestock to meat packing plants all over the US) but also had excellent restaurants, barber shops, and rumored to have had the best pork tenderloin sandwiches (tenderloin slabs that smothered a large dinner plate with meat hanging over the edges), and other businesses. Farmers from all over Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, and Kansas (if they didn’t go to the smaller one in Wichita) would haul in their livestock. Fortunes were made. It was also a place that my paternal grandparents (his second wife) worked, met, and fell in love. Trains noisily hauled animals in and out constantly. Trucks rolled in and out at all hours. Farmers would literally spend a whole day at the Exchange building because of the involvement and volume of livestock that ran through their stockyards. Even after the stockyards were gone leaving just the building, the property smelled of livestock manure for years after. For St. Joseph, the Exchange was their crown jewel.
Over a hundred years later with the stockyards long gone, office personnel long-since left, the building empty and eventually decay set in. Although fought hard, reluctantly to a lot of people, the building was torn down leaving now only the front porch to the building to stand as a singular monument to this once vibrant area of St. Joseph. And with it along with local politicians killing unions, St. Joseph began a horrible demise. In the 1970s and 80s, industries left in droves for cheaper land, cheaper labor, and where unions could thrive south in Kansas City or just across the Missouri River in Kansas. But throughout the 1800s and early 1900s, St. Joseph thrived. Its population grew so incredible and there was so much progress made, that it was THE place to live and work. Many companies made millions, resources were plenteous, labor was hardly in short supply, and with the railroad and barge traffic, St. Joseph seemed to be the city on the hill for progress. Installed in 1919 atop the Corby Building (one of the tallest if not the tallest building in St. Joe) there was a lit sign that read, “St. Joseph The City Worthwhile”. And because of the city’s central location of the US, farmers benefited from this city. It was often said that cattle and row crop paid the bills, but hogs (pigs, swine) paid for the farm. St. Joseph was and still is one of the homes for premier slaughterhouses and meat-packing facilities cities in the US.
St. Joseph, one of the stops for the late President Abraham Lincoln, and was cutting edge with events at Lake Contrary with its amusement rides and recreation as well as bands and theater as well as technological advances of electricity before much else of the country had it, has suffered with a blight that is beyond old and dilapidated buildings and crime. Crime: the poisoning of the mind. For some people success can be worse than failure because usually when things keep going up, it makes the crash downward that much harder. Despite St. Joseph growing rapidly outward on the east and north sides with new businesses and new homes, the population has been in a decline for the past three decades which feeds the angst to leave St. Joe or stay and live with its limitations. Many of the minds in and around St. Joe are filled with “this is the best” I can hope for. And for any form of success and to get out of the mire, we have to go to Kansas City or Oklahoma or elsewhere. Even if escape or growth or success can be possible, there seems to be a ceiling. Deuteronomy 28:23 MSG translation says, “The sky over your head will become an iron roof, the ground under your feet, a slab of concrete. From out of the skies GOD will rain ash dust down on you until you suffocate.” They, like Israel, desire for a glory…the former glory. After decades of captivity, Israel’s people made their trek back to their homelands under the rule of King Cyrus. The temple was rebuilt but the hearts of the older people is that temple is inferior, like what is said in Haggai 2.
As the Bible shares, centuries pass and God is doing a glorious thing. Jesus ascended to Heaven, the Holy Spirit came, people are getting saved left and right. Miracles are a common occurrence. God is just simply moving. Not an outward thing or from the outside. But God is doing something new and wonderful on the inside of the hearts of people (a metaphor and fulfillment of Isaiah 43:19 which says, “Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth; shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.” The healing flows of water that Ezekiel prophesied about in chapter 47 is the blood of Christ, the resurrection power alive in us who are/were dead (in our sins), and the anointing of the Holy Spirit empowering us and propelling us. A need arises in Acts 9 amongst the Hellenists that the widows are being neglected. Seven are appointed to serve. These are not menial tasks as they needed people who were filled with the Holy Spirit. A couple of the ministries of the Holy Spirit is the administrations or the serving and working/teaching of Christians. Often a neglected group—the aged and infirmed, or why George Meüller became involved with the orphans and waifs of English society—is because there is a need. And for the church who did and should see it to be their heart to take care of people, to be the arm of the Lord (numerous scriptures to support this), a special force of Christians were tasked. And not only did God use them in the ministry of these widows, but they also grew and flourished in other ministries the Lord directed—such as Philip—and more lives were touched. Stephen—among these special men—declared the Word of God powerfully and “the haters” were cut to the heart (oh to God that when we teach, speak, or preach the Word empowered by the Holy Spirit that He cuts to the hearts of the listeners while we just are a conduit for His flow). And a young man by the name of Saul held the garments while they arose and stoned Stephen.
Forever in the eyes of the Hellenists, Saul was a marked man. Scholars don’t have this exact, but some time within one to three years after the stoning of Stephen, Saul is converted. And because of dutiful men of God who ministered to him, Saul went from anti-Jesus to full on for Jesus. But an event occurs, and while pondering the matter of the stockyards the Holy Spirit brought this specific verse to me, which is found in Acts 9:29 (NKJV), “And [Saul] spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus and disputed against the Hellenists, but they attempted to kill him.” For the Hellenists, there was only Stephen who truly ministered to them. There were others and no doubt who loved Jesus with all their hearts, but they were not Stephen. Stephen held a special place in their heart. And with his death, so perhaps did their hope in Jesus. They were still getting their distribution. They still attended church. They still heard teaching and preaching. But the joy in their hearts, the spark in their eyes, the spunk in their step was missing. And much of it pointed back to Stephen. A root of bitterness settled. It is kinda like when someone did absolute evil against us, leaves for a period of time, and then one day shows up in the church or grocery store and immediately our eyes get fixed on that person. A glare, a sneer…we could have had a smile and ready to believe God for miracles and joy in our hearts and all of a sudden all we see is red. And this is what happened when the converted Saul stepped back onto the scene. We can look at it this way that a murdering child molester gets released from prison (literal or figuratively) because Jesus touched their life but all we want to do is “you killed an innocent godly man and we don’t want to hear anything about Jesus because how can God forgive you and you have a testimony and/or anointing”. And THIS RIGHT HERE is the whole focus. How can? How can someone who did (or accused to do) wrong is now being used by God? If God were truly for that person, then that man or woman never would had gone through what they did is what religious people think. We tend to forget that God restored and used all kinds of people who would not fit the church picture: Abraham was a liar and in our civil minds an adulterer, Moses was a murder, Joseph was accused and convicted for being a rapist/sex offender, David was combination of crimes, Noah was a drunkard, and on and on the list goes. And so how dare Saul step foot into our church. After all, church will never be the same without our beloved Stephen and it is all Saul’s fault.
And so has been the attitude for many of the citizens of St. Joseph especially when every rock was turned over, every money-making effort was tried, when even involving the state government failed, the Exchange of St. Joseph was torn down (and not torn down by a restorative committee, but a business who owned the land and wanted to develop/expand on it and the Exchange was in the way)…what people viewed as the last hope, the last foothold, the last handle to the past victory and glory of St. Joe. The Amplified Bible of Haggai 2:9 says, “’The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former’ says the LORD of hosts, ‘and in this place I shall give [the ultimate] peace and prosperity,’ declares the LORD of hosts.” I was just in St. Joe about a week ago. Yes, I still saw decay and decline…but I also saw new…lots of new. I saw the fulfillment of Isaiah 43 and Haggai 2:9 fighting its way in. The arch below is a testimony to a bright future. But what is missing? It isn’t what can come from the outside—billions invested, new businesses, development of houses and improvements of streets—but what can happen on the inside. Like the worst of the worst Saul who eventually became Paul did powerful things for the Kingdom of God. St. Joseph, Missouri (and a list of cities that I can easily and readily provide) isn’t dead and over. St. Joseph can be the heart of a revival and church-planting center with the Gospel that is able to touch hearts of concrete and break the bronze heavens for Him to pour out the latter rains of the Holy Spirit. Millions may be won…not in dollars…but in souls surrendered to Jesus. Who is ready to break ground and work?
