A Christmas Gift

A few months ago, a sixteen year old girl who attends one of North Way's suburban locations decided to do something that was very generous. Instead of receiving gifts at her birthday party, she asked people to give her cash donations that she could give away to a good cause. She received over $300 in cash, and she gave it to the LAMP mentoring program at North Way. She wanted the money to go to LAMP, but she only asked that it go to "help somebody who really needed it."

I prayed through how God might want me to steward this gift, and nothing really came up over the past couple of months. Then, right before Christmas a single mom from Homewood who has five children in the LAMP program called me to ask for help. She didn't have any money to provide a Christmas dinner or any gifts for her children this year, and I felt like God was prompting me to use the special gift from months earlier to provide Christmas support for this family. My family went shopping and brought a full Christmas dinner and some small gifts over to her house in Homewood, thanks to the generosity of a sixteen year old girl who decided to do something special on her birthday. When I explained the story to the mom in Homewood, she was so moved. We all prayed together, and I got to see first hand how much the gift meant to her this Christmas.

Stories like this remind me that God's profound love transcends all manmade social boundaries... suburban and urban, racial, economic, generational, and cultural. God is on mission to redeem the world all of the time, and ordinary followers of Jesus play an important role in that mission. I was thankful to be an eyewitness to God answering a mom's prayer this Christmas.

A Rough Start to Christmas Morning

My Christmas Day probably started off differently than most people. I was jolted out of a deep sleep in the early morning hours by a gun battle going on right outside of my house. We hear gun shots relatively often in Homewood, but these shots fired were the closest they've ever come to our house. I've been talking to some neighbors this morning trying to sort out the details... the police came, but we still don't know who was shot in the pickup truck in the middle of our street or if that person survived. Thankfully, our daughters sleep with loud fans in their rooms and they didn't hear the gun shots. So, we woke up on Christmas morning and opened our gifts as we normally do, but my pastor's heart is heavy for the violence in my neighborhood. Working toward bringing God's shalom in my city comes with many challenges, and gun shots are just a reminder of the ups and downs that come with advancing the kingdom of God in a complex urban environment. Just a few hours before this shooting, God worked through me to lead several people into a relationship with Jesus Christ at our church's Christmas Eve worship service. In times like these, I must trust God for the protection of my family. That's a big part of urban incarnational ministry. On this Christmas Day in 2012, I am thankful that God provided a hedge of protection around my girls from the gunfire last night. And, I am all the more resilient in my calling to do something about the violence that is in my city and right on my doorstep. There may be evil in this world, but I know how things go for our enemy. God wins!