“No One Here Does That…”

A few weeks ago, as Halloween was approaching, my room mates at the Micah 6 House and I decided that we should do something for Halloween. The obvious conclusion was try to get some of our friends out here to hand out candy with us. A few days later, our friend Cole at Rochester College volunteered to bring about 40 students out for a trunk-or-treat.  And that’s how it started.

Leading up to the event, the three of us printed out flyers and knocked on every door within three blocks of our house.  We told anyone who was brave enough to open the door (we did get several people shouting, “I paid my electric bill!”) that we were going to be in front of our house handing out candy.

We stopped by the house of an old friend that I mentioned before.  He answered the door, and asked what we were up to.

“We’re going to be handing out candy at our house tonight.  We’ve also got some friends coming and handing out candy with us.”

He, in a moment of real honesty, said “You know, no one does that, right?”

I asked for some clarification, and he explained “no one trusts this neighborhood enough to let their kids out at night, and no one trusts their neighbors enough to open the door when someone knocks.”

“Well,” I said. “We’re going to do it!”

“I’ll bring my kids over, because I know and like you guys.”

We got the same kind of reaction from people all over our neighborhood.  Many of them said, “We weren’t going to take our kids out, but we want to come.  Is it okay if we don’t have costumes?”

“Totally!”

Our friends from Rochester college pulled up, opened their cars and started getting ready to hand out candy.  Kids trickled in, most without costumes, but all excited for candy.  Parents stopped off, said thanks and walked back home with their kids.

In the end, we probably had the same number of volunteers as we did kids–close to forty.  We had a good turn out on both the volunteer and kid front.  It was a good time had by all and hopefully an event that we can build on in the future as we continue to establish our house as a place of peace in this neighborhood.

 

No Black and White

We like organization, structure and lists.  We like to be able to say, “this goes here and that goes there.” In movies and I think in life we like to know who the good guys are and who the bad guys are.

Real life, as I am learning, isn’t that easy.

 

Navigating Dependency

We have a neighbor that has taken a liking to us.  By taking a liking to us I mean she calls, comes over or catches us on the street and asks us for help.  Sometimes it is a ride to the grocery store, sometimes it is asking us to buy her a phone card, other days it is asking us for furniture, to buy food she is selling our of her kitchen, etc.

That “etc.” is a funny thing to add because from day to day we never know what it is going to be with her.  Initially, we were open and glad to help.  Driving her around town to fill our this paper, helping her find clothes at this place and helping her wasn’t a problem.  We love Jesus and we’re glad to help.

 

Getting Known in Our Community

We want to be a positive force in our community.  I know that.  Everyone in the house knows that.  Many people in Rochester know that.  But how do we let our neighbors know that?

This has been something that has been rolling around in my head for a little while.  Now that we are all moved in to our home at 32 Newberry, how do we begin to get to know the neighbors and start plugging in to our community?

I will give you a few examples of things we are doing here at the Micah 6 house that may be insightful.

 

Vacant Lot Spirituality

Vacant land is the common bi-product of shrinking populations.  These vacant lots can be places of blight and despair or affordable ways to make a positive impact in the neighborhood

Pontiac’s population is on a slow decline.  As people leave the city their houses often sit empty, to be reclaimed by nature or torched by squatters.  Eventually, the city comes in and will level the house, leaving only a vacant lot.  The city owns many of these, the county owns others and they are looking to unload them for reasonable prices.

The Micah 6 house is actually located next door to one of these lots.  The house was recently demolished and folks have begun using it as a place to dump their garbage.

 

Micah 6 House

Hello everyone!  I wanted to give a quick Micah 6 Community update…

WE HAVE OUR HOUSE!

From now on, Micah 6 Community will be living and working out of 32 Newberry in Pontiac.The house is 2,800 square feet, six bedrooms and in great shape.  We bought it, taxes included for just over $12,500.

Today Kim and I spent a good amount of time moving things in, tearing out carpet, cleaning the floors and meeting the neighbors.

But there is one problem…we’re broke.

Some time ago we started the 1000×20 fundraising campaign where 1000 of our friends donated $20 each.  Well, we have currently raised just enough to buy our house, but we are tapped out.  So much so that we can’t even turn the power on just yet or hire a plumber to fix some things in our basement.

We’re looking for more of our friends to step up to the task and donate $20 to finish getting us into the house and begin the work of meeting neighbors, planting gardens and most importantly showing Christ in our neighborhood.

All donations are tax deductible because Rochester Church of Christ is helping to handle our funds for us.

If this is something you can help us with, please do!

Checks should be made payable to Rochester Church of Christ with Micah 6 Community in the memo line and sent to:

Micah 6 Community
P.O. Box 431704
Pontiac, MI 48343

Thank you in advanced for the love, support, help and encouragement!

 

The Kingdom is a Park

I was at a communi-D barbecue the other day.

I had some friends who were at their first barbecue ever. They had heard me talk about it a little bit, but this was the first time we were all able to come out together.

When they got there some of us split off to go play ball, others sat down with a group of young girls and paint nails, another sat and had good talks with some of the other kids who were interested in neither.

 

Why Africa Matters to Your Community

I wrote several days ago about people’s strong feelings about missions as sponsored by their local congregations. I have talked with preachers, elders and lay people alike who constantly wrestle with what portion of the church budget to send to workers overseas and how to answer people who ask questions about African missions and what relevance that holds for a church called to be a local expression of  Jesus.

First of all, I don’t really care for the local-foreign division in how we see missions.  I would rather see missions thought of as the outgrowth of a Christian life and devotion. Just like we don’t think of local-foreign peace or local-foreign study, there is just peace, just study, there should just be mission.

 

We Blew Up a Birthday, God was Pleased

This Saturday I was at Elevate Detroit’s barbecue in Pontiac.

If you didn’t know, basically Elevate Detroit just starts barbecues in communities in order to create events and spaces for neighbors to meet each other, churches to serve together and community to grow. Pontiac is the location that I work with the most since I am going to be moving there soon and starting M6C. It tends to be lower-income, mostly former blue-collar workers who have been laid off from any one of the many factories that used to be here, but that’s a different story.

 

Preferring a One-Night-Stand over Church

I got to East Lansing a little early on Sunday.

For those who are unaware I have been driving out there for church on Sundays.  I am filling the pulpit at Greater Lansing Church of Christ, a small congregation that is interested in getting outside themselves and really beginning to engage their community. I think they asked me to come speak to them about what we are planning to do in Pontiac in hopes that some of that passion would be contagious and they would begin to really think outside the box about how to reach out to folks in East Lansing, but anyway…