Today, we are excited to share about a new book entitled “CityFaith: Following Jesus in Expensive, Transient, Secular Places” written by Jared Kirk, pastor of Renewal Church in the Back Bay. In it, Pastor Jared shares his wisdom on topics such as living generously when housing is expensive, building healthy life-long relationships, and navigating singleness so that the city can be a place of spiritual growth and renewal. Jared is also an Eagle Scout with a degree in Biomedical Engineering, and you can find him around the city sailing, teaching, writing, drinking coffee, and searching endlessly for decent Mexican food. Below is the excerpt from the book about the fruit that emerged as the Rabens family committed to a church community from the get-go: a powerful story to combat the transience that is so common in cities. If you like what you read, you can purchase the book here!

Book Excerpt from City Faith Chapter 4, Decide to Make a Difference 

The city isn’t just for young people looking to advance in their careers nor is it mostly single-again people living near the action. Cities pick up everyone, and one of our most interesting families was the Rabens family.

Clay was an active-duty doctor for the Army. He found himself in the city because the military was sending him to Harvard School of Public Health. If you weren’t aware that the Army sent people to Harvard, then welcome to the club.

When Clay walked in the door of our church, he came with his two amazing teenage daughters, Madison and Jocelyn. Those two girls were godly, mature, and hard workers. They grew our youth ministry from zero to two. If you’re good at math you know that is infinity percent growth. By percentage, in my opinion, we were the fastest growing youth ministry in the universe. 

Even more impressive than his daughters was his wife, Brittany. She was a force of nature who could organize and improve the second coming of Jesus. Her passion for Jesus was off the charts, and when you met her, you instantly liked her. Within a day, you knew she was probably a better leader than you. She was that good.

When you are a Harvard educated army doctor who is the fourth most impressive person in your family, that’s really saying something.

What we learned from the Rabens family is the impact you can have when you decide to make a difference from day one. Because they were military, they already knew what so many in the city take too long to learn: if you’ve only got a year or two, then you need to invest from day one, otherwise you will miss out on the meaningful relationships or the impact you would have had.

The second week they came, the Rabens joined our church as members. A month later, Brittany was leading the outreach ministry to Mary Ellen McCormack, the largest, low-income housing development in the city. Within a few months, she was leading a small group with a mix of church attenders and housing development residents. By the end of the year, one of our friends from Mary Ellen McCormack was baptized in a repurposed horse trough in a one hundred-year-old high school because of Brittany’s influence in her life.

It would have been so easy for the Rabens to coast for the one year they lived in Boston. There were good reasons to just wait and join a church when they moved away to Ohio, or they could have visited six other city churches before they made a decision on where to worship. Our church wasn’t a great fit for them demographically. I mean, we didn’t even have one other teenager. Yet Clay and Brittany learned something from the Army that can benefit every person who ever moves to a city: when time is limited “good enough” is good enough. Find a place where you can make an impact and throw yourself into it because you might change someone’s eternity, like the Rabens did.

You have the same choice to make. You can wait for the “perfect” church, you can coast until you move somewhere more permanent, or you can decide to invest right now, right where you are, and make a difference. I’m not talking about going to a church that teaches heresy or not caring about doctrine. I’m talking about dialing down the “picky-meter” for the sake of making an impact.

BARRIERS TO SERVICE

Three of the most common barriers to serving in the city are the overwhelming need outside of the church, narcissism inside the church, and good old-fashioned scheduling.

One reason people don’t jump in and make a difference at their church is because there is an overwhelming need for people to serve outside the church. Socially conscious companies have volunteer programs, boys and girls clubs need mentors, the Red Cross needs workers, and the city sponsors trash cleanup day. Those things are good, and we do all those things, but they are no substitute for loving God’s people.

Another reason people don’t serve in the city is a little embarrassing, but it’s true. Narcissism is rampant in the city. Image matters, and people strive to be seen on social media as serving, but when it gets hard, people leave off from helping. We once had a person stop serving because they were asked to stop taking selfies while they were greeting guests. They were so offended they quit! 

Narcissism used to be called vanity, which is excessive pride in one’s appearance or accomplishments. You’ve never run into anyone like that in the city, have you? The real danger of vanity is that you are so busy looking in the mirror that you can’t see yourself clearly. Jeremiah 4:30 (NIV) talks about the dynamics of narcissism:

“Why dress yourself in scarlet and put on jewels of gold? Why highlight your eyes with makeup? You adorn yourself in vain. Your lovers despise you.”

The way narcissism works is that you spend all your money to look nice on the outside, to cover your insecurities on the inside, and to impress people that don’t even like you.

However, the number one reason people don’t get in the game right away and start making an impact is that they are overscheduled. In the suburbs, this tends to manifest through kids’ sports, but in the city, it shows up in overscheduled social commitments, non-stop recreational activities, or an unhealthy rhythm of work and rest. Maybe you are overscheduling yourself because you don’t know how to be alone with Jesus or with yourself. Maybe you can’t stop working because your achievements are your life; they are how you justify your existence.

The beautiful thing about following Jesus is that He sets you free from all of this. Trusting in His wise leadership of the world lets you place your desperate needs at His feet. Trusting in His love for you can heal the wound that causes vanity to spring forth. Jesus justifies you with His blood so that you don’t have to try to justify yourself with your accomplishments. Jesus once said, “my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matt. 11:30 NIV) and He meant it. When you follow Him, you can relax and slow down enough to care for and serve the people in your life. You can make a difference because of the difference Jesus has made in you.

Our blogger this week is Pastor Sam Acevedo from Congregation Lion of Judah. Sam Acevedo is the Executive Director of the Boston Higher Education Resource Center (HERC) since its founding in 1999. He also serves as one of the founding Co-Chairs of the Boston School Committee’s Opportunity and Achievement Gap Task Force. Today, Pastor Sam shares about the need to prayerfully repent and act to change the “Digital Divide” on behalf of our city’s most vulnerable children.

So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.  James 4:17 (ESV)

Sometimes it takes a crisis to inspire us to do what we ought to have done all along.  To do what was always within our power to do, but we lacked the will to do.  And it often takes an arc of years – decades, even generations – to appreciate the depth and devastation of what the ancients called our “sins of omission”.  Our “Lord, I should have . . .” sins.

Take, for instance, the “Digital Divide”.  The first time I heard that term was at a conference in Worcester some 17 years ago.   It was becoming evident that lack of access to data, and the technology that transmitted that data (personal computers and broadband), was opening a new and alarming gap in racial equity and economic opportunity; and that this “divide” threatened most devastatingly the children and youth of black and Latino households.  In the room, and at the podium, was a sampling of those who would arguably play an influential role in closing that divide: people in philanthropy; elected officials; corporate, non-profit, and academic leaders.  “We should do something about this,” they all concluded with great urgency, before we adjourned and went home.  But as late as last March 2020 – as school buildings closed in response to the global pandemic, hurtling 50,000 BPS children into compulsory “remote learning” – 1 in 3 Black and Latino households in America still lacked access to computers and broadband. 

What to do?  Within two weeks of the school closures, Boston Public Schools was distributing 20,000 new Chromebooks to home-bound students of color throughout Boston.  Another 10,000 Chromebooks went out to BPS families this Fall. No internet access?  Portable “hotspots” suddenly appeared in homes with no previous wireless access; cable companies, sounding magnanimous, waved contract fees and other barriers to connectivity.  Eureka.  A yawning “Digital Divide” – that everyone was aware had persisted for decades – was being bridged, seemingly overnight.  But where did all this stuff come from?  And why did it take so long?  And why did it take this – a global pandemic – to address it?

Now take Exam School admissions . . . It is axiomatic that black, Latino, and other students of color are woefully underrepresented among those enrolled in BPS’ elite schools.  It is so axiomatic that for generations – easily over 100 years – there has been one attempt or another to see more children of color enrolled in Boston’s top-shelf public schools, but little has ever changed.  It is, in fact, so axiomatic that eight years ago, when the organization I run – the Boston Higher Education Resource Center (HERC) – began sending Coaches into BPS classrooms to pave a path to college for first-generation BPS youth, we made a conscious decision to focus on “non-exam” high schools: 82% of Black and Latino kids attend a school other than an Exam School, we reasoned – and the few who did make it into an Exam School would be “fine”. 

So I was bewildered when God – and I am now quite convinced it was God – had me serving this summer on the Exam School Working Group, convened to do two things: (1) figure out how to do “Exam School” admissions in a year beset by interrupted learning, and where having masses of children sitting for an actual “exam” would be unwise; and (2) figure out, if possible, how to see more students of color admitted to BPS’ elite schools.  For six weeks, four hours a week, we poured over the data.  As we did, I sensed the Holy Spirit confronting me and convicting me, deeply.  The data shook what we knew, or thought we knew, about our black, Latino, and other historically-marginalized children, and their path to Boston’s Exam Schools.  A path, we saw, that was laden with disheartening obstacles as early as third grade.  “No wonder – why hasn’t anyone seen this before now?”  That data was telling us, as our hearts sank, that there would be no magic bullet, no quick fix.  We did what we could to recommend a path forward for the 1,100 children seeking admission to our Exam Schools in the wake of a global pandemic.  And we steeled ourselves for the long, and difficult, work of ending generations of inequity keeping our black and Brown children from the best education BPS has to offer. 

It can be done.  That is the good news.  It’s just going to take time.  And the will to do it. 

The COVID-19 crisis has shone a glaring beam of inescapable truth, exposing these long-ignored inequities to the surface, and eliminating “inaction” as an option.   It is just like God – the Defender of the powerless, the Voice of the voiceless – to do that.  “Now, you must see; now, you must mourn,” the Lord seems to be saying, “Now, you must act.”  As a community we can celebrate that, after decades, we are finding the way, the means, and the will, to do or at least begin to do, for our most vulnerable children, what we long ago should have done.   But we must also stand, in community repentance, for the countless generations of children whose lives might have turned out very differently, if we had done far sooner what a crisis is compelling us to do now. 

Whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.  The “Lord, I should have . . .” sins are often the hardest to identify, and repent of, and confess.   As a community.  And as individuals who will stand before the eyes of a holy God who sees into our hearts.  It is a wonderful act of grace that the Lord should reveal to us, and entrust us with, “the right thing to do”.  May He add to that, the grace to actually do it.

Prayer: Lord we bring to you our “I should have . . . “ sins.   Ours, and the “I should have . . . “ sins of our people.   We love our children, God, especially those who face seemingly insuperable hurdles to endure, to overcome, and to succeed.  And we thank you for the treasures you have bestowed on this community – the teachers, the administrators, those in government, those in philanthropy, those in academia, those in ministry, those who lead schools, those who lead businesses, those who lead churches – everything and everyone needed to execute the desires of your Heart, and to see your will done on earth as it is in Heaven.  Bless the children of Boston Public Schools.  And give us the means – and the will – to bless them, as well.  

More on Supporting Urban Schools

The Boston Education Collaborative is currently recruiting volunteers to remotely help teachers with their Zoom classes as well as tutoring in after school/before school programs – They are currently at 1/5 of the way of their goal to get 150 volunteers! More info here.

“Behold, I am Doing A New Thing” – a blog written by Ruth Wong about how God has been at work through the pandemic in nurturing new collaborations between churches and city institutions.

“The Church and the Village: The Value of Church/School Partnerships” – a blog written by Pastor Barry Kang about the value of churches supporting schools.

“In our current society, people who disagree with you about issues in life, especially political ones, are often regarded as “enemies”.  This is unhealthy for our nation in general, and it is especially so for our spiritual lives.  As followers of Christ, we cannot view others as enemies!”
-Pastor Dave Hill, Abundant Grace Church

Today, we want to share a devotional by Pastor Dave Hill from Abundant Grace Church in Brighton. He encourages us to consider our heart postures towards one another and those we consider as our “enemies.” Pastor Dave also shares a personal example of how he has engaged in conversation and listening across deep political divides with other pastors. This is a crucial message in a time of great division and political animosity to embrace a lifestyle of reconciliation.

Today I would like to look again at Luke 6, verses 27-29a: “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also….”.

These are some of Jesus’ hardest instructions–love your enemies and do good to those who hate and hurt you.  This is completely counterintuitive and unnatural.  It goes against our natural instincts to defend ourselves and to retaliate.

In our current society, people who disagree with you about issues in life, especially political ones, are often regarded as “enemies”.  This is unhealthy for our nation in general, and it is especially so for our spiritual lives.  As followers of Christ, we cannot view others as enemies!  We must learn to love them and to pray for them.  While dying on the cross Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34)  His Spirit lives in you, and you must crucify your flesh and allow the Spirit to control your thoughts and actions.

Martin Luther King Jr. said this: “Love is the only force capable of turning an enemy into a friend.”  Representative John Lewis, who recently went home to be with the Lord, related how those involved in the struggle for civil rights chose to see their struggle as one against an unjust system, not against people.  “We wanted to win them over.  We saw them as our brothers.”  Wow, and amen!

This was spoken about people who were cursing them, beating them and jailing them.  Most of us do not have hurdles nearly that high in loving our enemies.  Let us take this to heart and seek the Lord.

Do not make the serious error of thinking of others “who need to hear this message”.  You and I need to hear it.  Are you offended with someone?  Posting things online that dishonor Jesus?  Avoiding someone because you simply do not like them?  Entertaining mean thoughts towards another?

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them… But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be childrenof the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked”(Luke 6:32&35, NIV).  We are privileged to be called children of the Most High, and we must make every effort to live up to that high calling.

Here is a way to put into practice what Jesus taught during this election:  ask someone you think or know does not share your political views why they are voting for president the way they are.  You will probably find that they have solid thoughtful reasons for why they vote as they do.  As believers, we must realize that there are other believers who love Jesus and believe in the Bible just as much as we do who will vote for someone we don’t like.  Seeking to listen rather than to judge honors Jesus.  You may not become convinced of their position, but it will help you get over viewing them as an “enemy”.  We are required by our Lord to love each other!

I pray with a dozen or so other pastors every Wednesday via Zoom.  With all that has gone one with racial issues and politics we decided to stay on for an hour once a month to hear each other’s perspectives on these issues.  We are a diverse group with whites, Asian Americans and African Americans.  One of the African American pastors, simply being honest, asked, “Can one of you explain to me why white Evangelicals like President Trump?”  That is being bold and blunt, which is what we need.  Because we all love and respect each other, he could ask that kind of question and we discussed it at length.  It was both informative and edifying.  It strengthened our relationships.  You actually will find yourself feeling closer to someone when you are willing to discuss a controversial subject in love.  That is what we did, and I hope you can be blessed by doing the same.

Father, I know these words of Jesus are true, but they daunt me.  Yet today I choose to humble myself and repent of evil thoughts, nursing grudges, proud put downs and viewing anyone as an enemy.  I want to be like You!  Please create in me a clean heart that is kind to the ungrateful and loves those who do not love me.  I need Your help.  I want to be free.  Thank you that what is impossible for me is possible with You.  For Your mercy and transforming grace I am truly grateful.  Amen.

Other Great Resources

Red & Blue Guide by Essential Partners, which offers great tips in how to engage in conversations with those of differing political viewpoints.

Guide to Election Preparedness, put together by the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston & Boston Ten Point Coalition, Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center, Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston, and the Massachusetts Council of Churches

AllSides.com, which “strengthens our democratic society with balanced news, diverse perspectives, and real conversation. We expose people to information and ideas from all sides of the political spectrum so they can better understand the world — and each other.”

Research and Tips for Church Leaders for Navigating Election Season – from Barna

“We deliberately sought to understand the histories of these countries. We wanted to help heal the fears that divide us from these resilient people. We hoped our style of travel could demonstrate that a real God exists who can be relied on in even the harshest insecurities.”

This week, we want to feature a blog written by Roger and Claire Dewey, who recently published a book based on their four-month ‘walk’ through Central America and Cuba. Roger was called in 1968 to work against the racism in the Church, founding Christians for Urban Justice. Claire joined him in 1977, teaching in the public schools and raising their family in Dorchester, where they still live. They are members of Reservoir Church in Cambridge, and all profits from their book entitled “We’re Lost. This Must Be the Way” will go to those in Central America who shared their stories of hope and resilience. 

Today we’d like to share the spiritual thinking behind our four-month ‘walk’ through Central America and Cuba. It was not to be a vacation. Instead, we wanted to explore the fears that divide so many of us from these resilient people. And it was largely unplanned—most nights, to find where to stay, we listened for “nudges” from God, while trying to understand the stories being lived all around us. We wanted our style of travel to demonstrate that a God exists who we actually can rely on in even the harshest insecurities.

Since our Mexican honeymoon 40 years earlier, we’d been in Latin America many times. We’d driven a rental car all around Guatemala with our children, scouted sites in Honduras for possible retirement, and visited friends throughout the region who are missionaries. Those countries have long been places of joy and adventure, and a resource for spiritual growth.

But we’ve watched their people become objects of fear for many Americans. It is sad to see those we love mischaracterized, those who welcome us into their homes fearfully excluded and humiliated. We feel God’s deep sorrow over our political division from so many members of Christ’s Body.

Before we left Boston, our plumber Mario, a humble believer from El Salvador, became unusually loquacious. “When you go” he said, “listen to what they have. They have what we here do not have, what we are losing in the shadows. They want what we have, but here we are under pressure to keep moving. The communication between us is what is important, not the work we do. That communication is love. So you go to another country, and see what they have that we need, and bring it back to us. Because we really need what they have.”

Though we both grew up as evangelicals, we are disturbed by today’s divisive Christianity, bothered by our religion’s search for security and power through the control of culture. Can’t our daily fears and anxiety actually be overcome by the God who walks with us? 

We perceived our journey as a practical exploration of life as a non-programmed walk with God. When lost we listened hard, looking for some hint of guidance. We were not always sure this trust was appropriate, or what, if anything, we heard. This “listening” is not very specific; it’s like learning piano by ear instead of reading music. 

A tightly planned trip would never have allowed us to discover the huge diversity of those we met, and then see them through God’s eyes. Like Eduardo, who once had a small but successful carpentry business in Guatemala. One by one, four of his brothers were killed as a result of extortion gone bad. He saw the caravans as his ticket to life and hope for him and his family. We heard from several missionaries that the ‘border invasion’ is mostly children of families like those they know, desperate to avoid being killed or trapped in the gangs.

On a tightly planned trip, we would never have visited the garbage dump in Guatemala City where 3,000 human beings live and work, scavenging trash, surrounded by muck and garbage. Many are Maya Indians who fled there for safety when their government burned and demolished 600 villages. For many, Jesus is their only trusted companion.

A Honduran woman told us her younger brother foolishly stole a bike, then learned it belonged to the son of a drug lord. He received death threats. His family raised money to help him escape to the U.S. She was proud of her brother, but talking about him made her depressed. “When everything goes wrong,” she said, “we can’t afford to be lamenting our situation if we don’t go ahead with the help of God. He is the only one who holds out an extended hand.”

We frequently felt lost. We lived a bit like strangers and immigrants, forced to play a game without knowing the rules. Change was constant. Yet our total insecurity, it turned out, was one of the best experiences of all. We gained empathy from generous families with virtually nothing. And we repeatedly sought Jesus’ counsel for loving those whose needs we could not meet, and loving the politicians who were part of their problems. Again and again, we experienced the security of God’s presence.

Near the end of our journey, we struggled to understand the complexity of Cuba. Easter Sunday, in Havana’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, we met 85-year-old Raul. In 1961, at the time of the U.S. sponsored invasion by Cuban exiles, he had been a Southern Baptist seminarian. He became a medic, and was wounded while defending his country. As a pastor in the ‘80s he led the Cuban Ecumenical Council, and in 1993 became the first Christian elected to the Cuban government. He wrote Martin Luther King Jr. for advice for living faithfully under a difficult government. He founded the MLK Center in Havana, and recounted his decades of struggle to live in the space between the goals of socialism and Jesus’ life of siding with the poor. We recorded our experiences each day, and compiled this record of our journey with a loving God, perhaps suggesting a way forward for Christians in our current troubled world. All profits will go to the whole-hearted people who opened to us their homes, their lives, and their wisdom. We think you will be encouraged by their simple stories of hope and resilience – you can click here to purchase the book.

“I remember feeling grateful for all my blessings, but sickened by the inequities around us and empowered to make an effort to do something more….It is my sincere prayer that this song will both entertain and inspire everyone who hears it, to do more, for those who are less fortunate.”

This week, we want to feature a song co-written by Issa Bibbins, who is a pianist, rapper and content curator and former minister of music at Roxbury Presbyterian Church. “Where Do We Go” is the sixth release on the Treatment Project. This song addresses homelessness and how a lack of empathy, greed, and indifference perpetuate this growing problem. As COVID-19 has furthered economic inequities in Boston, this is a timely and crucial message for contemplation and action – Watch his video below!

Issa describes: “This song started from a conversation with producer, singer, and long time collaborator Sam Jones about two months ago. I had just released the fifth song on The Treatment Project, titled  ‘Superhuman DNA,’ and I reached out to Sam about producing the next song on the project. I remember spending a few minutes talking about music, and the conversation shifting from music business, to friends checking in about life. We spoke about the changing responsibilities we both have, as ministers of music at Roxbury Presbyterian Church and New Hope Baptist Church. We discussed COVID-19 and how it has impacted live performance opportunities for musicians in the city. As we all have faced uncertainty during these complex times, it is interesting how vulnerability can give way to both fear and anxiety but also serve as a unique tool to inspire empathy for those who are less fortunate.

A few days later, Sam sent me a rough draft of the composition. It was as if divine inspiration was deposited into my consciousness as soon as I heard the first measure. The song literally wrote itself! My heart erupted with so much emotion, I finishing writing the first verse in less than twenty minutes. I remember feeling grateful for all my blessings, but sickened by the inequities around us and empowered to make an effort to do something more. Sam called artist “ItsyourboyKR”, and I called good friend and artist Abria Smith, and they masterfully brought completion to this piece of art. I had the privilege to volunteer with my daughter at the Friday Cafe at First Church in Cambridge to take an extra step in fulfilling this call to do more, which came as a result of this collaborative experience. It is my sincere prayer that this song will both entertain and inspire everyone who hears it, to do more, for those who are less fortunate.

To watch other videos from the Treatment Project, check out Issa Bibbins’ Youtube channel here. Also, you can learn more about Issa Bibbins music ministry at pearlfortheworld.com