But hope does not despair

I was raised in the beautiful and rustic state of Oregon, surrounded by mountains and woodland.  I was taught a white, middle class, evangelical worldview accented by eight years of private Christian schooling.  My parents both love each other and have raised me in a God-fearing home.  I am a white girl whose blonde hair and blue eyes have always helped me get whatever I strive for.  I was raised with a solid background of Bible-based Christianity geared toward suburban ideology.

Then God pulled me out and placed me in one of the largest cities in the country where he is preparing me for an intense, lifelong calling in one of the most dangerous and crucial parts of America: the inner city.  Where prostitution thrives, addictions kill, and gangs reign.  The education has quit educating, the idea of family is foreign, and dreams have died and sunk deep into the black pit of hopelessness.  This is no game. This is no amplification. This is now, and this is violently real.

How come God called a white girl from the backwoods of Oregon to be His representative in one of the darkest places on earth? I don’t know.  All I know is that my heart breaks violently inside my chest for the lost.  I long to scream in agony when compassion fills my soul.  I cry at the depravity and wince in pain when faced with the overwhelming statistics of urban suffering.  Babies are born with no fathers, young men fight to have an identity by pledging allegiance to a gang, and young women are thrown into prostitution in order to stay alive.  Pimps watch over their territory; women are their possessions.  Middle-aged men have given up the fight to stay alive and have instead resorted to a life of numbing addiction.  Single mothers struggle to provide for their children and cry out to an unknown God to keep their babies safe from the evil that surrounds them.

This is where I am called.

How it rings true when Isaiah writes,

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives and
release from darkness for the prisoners,”

I have come to the haunting realization that even after a lifetime of ministry, I may not even make a dent in attempting to solve the problems of the inner city.  But hope does not despair.

Many churches sit back and watch this epidemic unfold, too afraid to intervene and not knowing where to start.  So instead, the state steps in.  Politicians, instead of Christians, attempt to grapple with the issues of inner city poverty, family instability, violence, and moral decay.  Housing projects are formed and welfare is implemented; yet this does nothing.  People can never be reduced to a project.  Welfare has only promoted destitution and hopelessness, not improved it!

Why am I called?  What can I do? Nothing about my upbringing, my gender, or my race qualifies me to minister in the inner city.  I lack street smarts, I grapple with sin, and I wrestle to find identity.  Yet in the city I have found my place.  I long to follow Christ to the broken, to the hopeless, to the unloved, and to the sinful; because they are none of these things to God. To Him these people are precious, the Almighty God loves them, and they are each uniquely created in His image. God has instilled in each person a longing for purpose and identity that can only be found in Christ.  I rest knowing that when God calls someone to leave everything comfortable and familiar for a place of poverty and brokenness, obedience to the calling is what He requires, not a feeling of adequacy.