The Good News in Cleveland

Sundays downtown we project out prayer requests up on the screen. I recently had the thought that we could just chisel some of these lines into stone; they seem to describe eternally unwavering circumstances. However...  For as long as I have known Richard, he has been praying for his unsaved dad to come to faith. Richard himself has an amazing testimony as one who endured shame and hardship throughout his childhood in East Cleveland. He experienced severe racial hostility as a black-Asian mix. Even into his adult life, he has battled fear, anxiety, and loneliness. Richard answered Jesus' call more than seven years ago and, though he's been through many ups and downs, good times and hard times, he has demonstrated serious faith and commitment to know the Word. Richard stood in the gap, uniquely qualified to speak into his dad's life. His dad went down with a stroke and is, even now, secluded in an assisted living apartment near Kinsman on the east side. (As an edit...

So much bad happens that I can't even disclose. In short, our kids are into some heavy stuff. We get these rude awakenings from time to time that Cleveland is not a good place. Don't get me wrong: I love it here, and I love the people. (And I break from Caleb love into Jesus' love when I love the people that are hard to love.) We really have to be walking in the grace of God in order to minister to people walking in shameless entitlement. One little story I can tell... It's actually about me being the unloving one. Lesson learned though. Jesse's phone went missing this week. We tracked it all over the city using Find My iPhone. When Cardin and I finally caught up with the guy, he wanted $20 for it. I asked him if he didn't have anything better to do that take people's phones out of their cars. He was offended though; evidently he had only found it somewhere. From his perspective, he was some sort of patron saint of Cleveland to return the phone (for money)...