A Family Feud
Just coming back from having a great lunch with Joshua and Burt the Anti-Graffittii Czar for the Mayor’s Office (which I will talk more about later) I noticed a Police car on the corner of our campus facing the Mini-Mart across the street. As I got out of the car I could hear some serious yelling going on… I had an idea who it was and so I walked toward Hertel in front of the Renovation House and sure enough we had us another Family Feud going on.
The first time that I walked through the campus I experienced the same Family Feud… what was a little shocking was the intensity and vulgarity that was coming not from the kids but from the mom… while her beautiful little 6 yr old daughter stood right beside her.
Today it went beyond the front porch to across the street to grandmother’s house and all of NW Buffalo could hear it… I am sure they could…
Josh and I went over two times to help cool the situation down… it was about to get real ugly…
We have already seen 2 people shot and killed and handful of others injured in just the past few days in our neighborhood… didn’t want to see anymore tragedy hit our streets.
As Josh and I stood there by the basketball hoop (we escorted the two brothers behind the Aud to help them ‘cool’ down a little) I could see the pain, frustration in these young men’s eyes… a life-time of hate, anger, resentment, prejudice thrown at them from their own mom… of course they are going to respond in likeness… the vileness by which they spoke, I should say shouted at each other was practically demonic it was so wretched…displayed once again in the open as dozens of people walked by…
The Police Officer said she had been watching this go on for the last ten years. She thanked us for all that the Church was doing… cleaned up the property, after school programs (thanks Peace) a play was coming (once again thanks Peace) having things for kids and teens, for bringing positive energy to the neighborhood, caring enough to actually do something… she had processed all of these things by simply driving by over the past months… observing us.
Wow – God thanks for letting us have the chance to be a Light in a Dark place… the staff prayed today (again) that He would send us Laborer’s that were strong in heart, big in faith, humble in Spirit and willing to stay the course in serving and reaching this community that HE loves and wants to see RENOVATED from the inside out!
Just another day at the RC office!
