Reflections from the Inner-City

I served as the Program Director at an inner-city ministry. The years spent there changed my life forever.

Most cities sprawl and crawl to the suburbs leaving inner-city neighborhoods that most would like to ignore and avoid. Prostitutes solicit on corners. Neighborhoods die and decay. Drug dealers and criminals dominate the streets. Children and teenagers struggle to survive life in these darkened surroundings. Such was the description of the inner-city neighborhood in which God placed me to serve during this cancer battle. In man’s eyes, it seemed like the most unlikely task that I should be called to, but as we well know, God’s ways are not our ways.

I spent nearly three years striving to help meet the spiritual, physical, educational, and social needs of children, teenagers, and their families. Their needs were great. Their families were crushed and desperate. They were hungry and dirty and sometimes homeless. Knowing the faithfulness of my Heavenly Father who had so often answered my personal prayers for healing and provision, I confidently knew that He would do no less for these beloved children.

I sat to work attempting to meet basic needs of life – food, clothing, safe after-school care, tutoring, and most importantly, a daily Chapel time. I have experienced God’s powerful presence at many churches, at large Christian conferences with thousands of believers united in prayer and praise, yet some of the most powerful manifestations of the Lord, I witnessed in that tiny, cramped, inner-city Chapel where many children gathered who had never been introduced to their Loving Father.

Most did not even know the love of their earthly fathers. Single mothers raised most of these children and teenagers. Children boldly confessed their problems and I would drive home many night with tears stinging my eyes at the thought of what life situations were being imprinted on the tablets of these children’s hearts. Only with the knowledge of a loving, compassionate, faithful God was I able to return, day after day, to be His hands and mouth to this chapel of the lost, the hungry, and the frightened.

As they learned more about Him, the level of intimacy in their praises increased. My best friend came to chapel one evening and witnessed the heartfelt praises of these children as they closed their eyes to the hurt and heartache of their lives and lifted hands to a God who was gathering in our midst. She wept.

My body was so tired and in pain. I pushed on, having to often repeat, “When I am weak, He is strong,” to just make it through the day. Somedays, I would have chemotherapy in the morning and then drive straight to the ministry. We had services and programs on three floors of our facility. God literally carried me up and down those steps on so many days. I knew beyond a shadown of a doubt that He alone would equip me – afterall, He had called me to that task and placed me in the midst of a field in need of planting and harvesting. It’s all about reminding ourselves as His servants, that it is not about us – it is not about our talent or lack of talent; it’s not about what we think we want or need to do, but what He has ordained for us to do on this earth.

For most of us as His servants, we will have to be totally focused on Him and relying on the guidance and empowerment of the Holy Spirit to complete our tasks. They might not always be easy or in our comfort zone, but by stepping into God’s plan and ignoring our own personal plans and desires, He will always bring success to our human efforts.