The Future (Day 11)

Sometimes tomorrow is uncertain. You can stress about what is going to happen. You can become anxious over what lies around the corner. You can try to believe that things will not work out and that it is all up to you to figure out every aspect of your life….Or you can take what Christ said in Matthew 6:33-34 and live by it: “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you. So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” I have never focused very much on verse 34 until one day I was sitting in a home located in the projects of Mobile Alabama and my teammate, Holly, shared it with the lady living there. I’ve had it on my mind ever since.

My vision for Revive certainly hasn’t changed, but the process of getting there has only become more complex. Challenges have come out the woodwork to confront me and my friends, but we will continuously refuse to stop campaigning the belief that the world will know that we are Christians by our love.

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The Inner-city

Before going to Mobile I had a far different vision in my mind of what the inner-city looked like. I guess I just did not understand the term and so the image in my head differed from what I encountered during the first day in Mobile. I imagined pot-holed streets,  decaying buildings gloomily crowded against each other with jagged windows, abandoned businesses, dark and creepy rat-filled alleys, etc – you know the image I’m describing. In other words, downtown Johnson City! (just kidding! Sort of.)

Instead, I encountered something that was far less melancholy (though there were some buildings/streets that fit that description above) when it comes to physical looks. However, I’ll be the first to admit that when I was given time to quietly ponder what I had seen in the inner-city on the first/second day, slowly realizing what type of situation a lot of these people were in, it quickly depressed me. I didn’t understand how I could possibly help these people.