Dorothy Davis bought her kids bikes last Christmas. That's a big deal in North Midtown, where Davis lives. This inner-city neighborhood in Jackson, Mississippi, was, until recently, a place where no responsible mother would let her kids play outside. Elderly residents wouldn't venture out to walk to the store. Drug traffic clogged North Midtown's streets, and crack addicts huddled in the neighborhood's numerous dilapidated, boarded-up "shotgun" houses. Today, most of the drug dealers have moved on, freshly painted, three-bedroom Habitat for Humanity-built homes sit where crack houses once were, and North Midtown kids carefully maneuver their bicycles around old folks out for an evening stroll.
Several organizations are responsible for North Midtown's transition from a crime and drug-ridden ghetto to an increasingly livable neighborhood. Christ United Methodist Church, a congregation of 4,200 members in suburban northeast Jackson, is one of them.
The Rev. John Case, senior minister of Christ UM Church, has preached for years that inner-city Jackson is a mission field not unlike distant lands. The church has always participated in various ecumenical outreaches to the city's poor, such as helping the homeless through emergency shelters and soup kitchens. When the United Methodist district leaders called meetings on improving their denomination's community service, Christ UM Church members participated eagerly. But, according to Martha Walton, Christ UM Church's Director of Missions, "they had meeting after meeting and brought in people for seminars, but it was just talk, talk, talk and meet, meet, meet; but never do, do, do. And we wanted to do!"
Walton and a few others began brainstorming on how Christ UM Church could start its own urban ministry, one based on the lessons church members had learned from their previous involvement in outreach. "Our first thought," Walton explains, "was that we needed to start small. We'd been frustrated in efforts that saw the whole of Jackson as the mission field. We realized that the church should target one neighborhood and do the best we could there, instead of trying to cure everything and wind up doing nothing." Church leaders had also figured out that the "relief-oriented" ministries with which they'd collaborated were "not meeting the total needs of the people. We realized we were not doing what the Bible really calls us to do," Walton continued. "Feeding someone, meeting someone's physical needs--that's good--but that doesn't make a disciple out of that person."
The church selected the North Midtown neighborhood as its target, and agreed to help Habitat for Humanity build several new homes there. Desiring to have a physical presence in the neighborhood, the church rented a two-bedroom apartment in North Midtown and converted it into a community center. Then Christ UM Church threw a big street party, complete with a fish fry and clowns, and interviewed residents to ascertain what they felt the community's chief assets and needs were.
"It became evident right away that in order to reach the people and open doors, it would be really good if we had a black minister to lead the initiative," Case reports. So Christ UM Church became the first white United Methodist church in Mississippi to call an African-American pastor.
Case asked the local bishop to help Christ UM Church identify a black pastor with experience in urban ministry. The bishop recommended Leon Collier, a 33-year-old graduate of Memphis Theological Seminary who had been running "Gentlemen of Quality" clubs for inner-city teens in North Mississippi for four years. The Clubs stress commitment to church, school, and community, and in Collier's words, "give the kids something positive to identify with." He'd been trying to spread the "GQ" model to other congregations and saw Christ UM Church's job offer as a chance to develop the clubs in Jackson.
Still, the idea of leaving a comfortable, fruitful ministry in a medium-sized, all black congregation to join a white, upper-middle-class, mega-church was a bit unsettling. "I was scared at first!" Collier admits with a laugh. He remembers the first time he stood in the pulpit during a Sunday morning worship service at Christ UM Church. "I looked out and saw all those white faces and the question flashed through my mind: `What in the world am I doing here?'" But, he says, "people talk about racial reconciliation and I guess this [job] is the perfect opportunity for my wife and me to work on that personally."
The Colliers have been amazed by the warm reception they've received. "I didn't know that the people were going to be so nice," Collier says. "I really kind of anticipated that out of 4,200 members somebody's got to have a bad attitude, but we haven't detected that here."
Case and Walton confirm that members have eagerly accepted their new pastor. "Everybody was for the church getting involved in urban ministry," Walton explains. "The only negative vibes came when we actually hired a black minister to stand in our pulpit. It was as if they felt, `Well, it's okay for us to go down there [to North Midtown], but this is something different, this is here.'" But only a few people expressed this objection and, Walton adds, "the really wonderful thing is that even those few who were initially reluctant have come around and are supportive."
According to Dorothy Davis, some of her North Midtown neighbors were initially skeptical of Christ UM Church's intentions, but here too, folks have come around. At first, Davis reports, "I heard some comments like, `The only reason these white people are here is to keep us out of their neighborhoods!' But after the residents saw that these well-off white people were genuinely loving and not just doing this to gain a name for themselves, they were won over." She says residents have responded extremely well to Collier, and many view him as their new pastor. "They feel comfortable with him," Davis smiles. "He's been really instrumental in bringing the neighborhood together. He doesn't walk around in a suit and tie and give people a complex," she adds. "He gets out there with his shorts on, his T-shirt and hat, and he laughs and talks with everybody."
Collier admits that getting the ministry up and running hasn't always been easy. Initially, he was disappointed when a local minister refused to let him house part of the outreach in the minister's church, because Collier represented a different denomination. On the other hand, another local pastor, the Reverend Chester Hicks, frequently gives devotionals at the GQ club meetings. Several young men in the club have accepted Christ and now attend Hicks' church. Collier and the other ministry leaders think that's great. "We're not trying to build a church there; we don't want to be in competition with [the local churches]," Case explains. "We're just trying to help them develop ministries among the people and meet needs and share the Gospel."
Collier says his greatest challenge in North Midtown is motivating the adult residents to get involved in the ministry's programs. "Two of the main things killing the inner-city are drugs and heavy alcohol use--this is the foundation for apathy," he asserts. Only a handful of neighborhood ladies attend the weekly Bible study and about ten participated in a parenting class. Some neighbors do pitch in to help Collier. Dorothy Davis runs the Ladies of Quality club with the help of another parent, Mary Gardner. Earl Owens, a custodian from Christ UM Church who lives in North Midtown, pays home visits, transports the kids on field trips, and supports the urban ministry in numerous other ways. All three individuals work full-time and are active in their respective churches; the ministry thus far hasn't been able to draw in many unchurched people. Of course, the ministry has been operating less than a year. Collier reports happily that one woman in North Midtown, who calls herself an atheist, showed up at the last Bible study meeting, offered a financial donation, and said to Collier, "God bless your efforts."
Recruiting kids has been easier than winning over adults. Only two youths came to the first meeting of the GQs and LQs, but after just six months, about 45 kids were attending regularly. One day Collier asked the youths why they joined the club. "Little ten-year-olds were saying, `It keeps me off the streets,'" he reports. "Back in September I was passing out flyers in front of the local school and some boys asked if they could help me," Collier recalls. Since he was almost finished, he told the kids they needn't bother--but the kids were insistent. "`Let us go with you,' they said, `cause all we're gonna do is stand out here and see guys selling drugs.'"
The Gentlemen and Ladies of Quality clubs give the kids a variety of alternatives to the destructive activities of street life. The kids plan fun events like field trips and pizza parties as well as community service projects--and participation in the latter is a prerequisite for involvement in the former. Collier monitors the kids' report cards and maintains contact with the kids' teachers and parents; club members can be suspended from the club if they're not living up to their academic potential. Club members must also regularly attend church. In weekly club meetings, Collier leads the kids in Biblically-centered discussions on issues of concern. On two other days each week, volunteer tutors from Christ UM Church come to North Midtown to help the kids with their homework. The ministry has also started a kids' choir.
Life in North Midtown is still tough. Just recently, two 13-year-old girls (one of whom is pregnant), brawled with iron rods and bricks in the middle of the street. Shootings still occur now and then, and welfare dependency remains high. But something special is obviously afoot. The neighborhood's physical appearance has changed substantially, and not just because of the many nice homes Habitat for Humanity has built. Dorothy Davis says the residents' pride is returning. She's lived in North Midtown for over ten years, and for most of them she was the only person who decorated her house at Christmas, or planted fresh flowers in the spring. Last Christmas, she reports gleefully, so many residents decorated their homes that people from other parts of the city came driving through to admire the lights. And this year the neighbors have formed a beautification committee and Davis is besieged with requests for advice about what kinds of flowers to plant.
The sense of community has strengthened, Davis adds. Collier agrees, noting that the kids in the clubs become friends, then want to spend time at each other's homes. This brings the parents into contact. "Before North Midtown became a community," Davis emphasizes, "you didn't feel comfortable letting your children go to somebody else's house. Now more parents trust their kids with other parents." The momentum sparked by Christ UM Church's ministry has also reinvigorated the local Neighborhood Association which had lain dormant. And Earl Owens says the church's provision of a community center has increased social interaction in North Midtown. "I don't have to holler way down the street to my neighbor," Owens explains. "The church has given us a place where we can meet each other and fellowship with each other."
Christ UM Church's urban ministry has not only rebuilt community in North Midtown. According to Minister Case, it has reinvigorated the sense of community within the church itself. It's difficult to cultivate that sense in a suburban, mega-church, he explains. But many members have formed "Covenant Groups," small groups which work together in the urban ministry or other mission projects. "The people working together in the urban ministry have developed close, in-depth relationships with each other," Case explains. "It's been a community-builder. I think it's the best thing we've done in missions since I've been here."
Dr. Amy L. Sherman is director of urban ministry at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlottesville, Virginia and author of Restorers of the Streets to Dwell In: Effective Church-based Ministry to the Poor (Crossway).
This article was printed in Good News magazine (September/October 1996).