This is part of doing ministry in urban neighborhoods...the signs of lives yet redeemed. The signs are all around us in this community...when I walked out of my house to take Micah to school, there was a firetruck with its lights on at the cop shop across the street. When I came out later to go to the church, there were a bunch of police on our block and down the street two cop cars with their lights on and police officers roaming around that block. Part of my work today around the block involved painting over the recent graffiti and replace the bulb they broke in the above light. Nothing big...just part of life around here. 
"Those from among you will rebuild the ancient ruins; You will raise up the age-old foundations; And you will be called the repairer of the breach, The restorer of the streets in which to dwell. Isaiah 58:12
One of the beauties of doing ministry in a rougher neighborhood is the multitude of opportunities to serve, repair, build up, restore and beautify. Being the people of God in a local area should mean that everyone around is blessed to have you present as neighbors and as participants in the church body that gathers on the block your facilities are at. I love how the prophet Ezekiel saw this living water of life flowing out of the temple and rising like a flood bringing its healing into barren and polluted places (Ez 47). All of that is so true spiritually, the reviving of dead men and women through the life resurrecting work of the gospel; through the Spirit of God in us, preaching, teaching, and engaging in community restoring work. Making familes, raising children, mowing lawns, picking up trash. Caring for the community by building healthy, nurturing relationships, loving the unlovable and our skeptical enemies until they surrender to the healing ethic of life that makes more sense than the brokenness and chaos around us. But it also is good news for the land, the neighborhood, the buildings, the parks, the wildlife, the gardens, the nutrition, the hunger and thirst...the health or as Jeremiah put it the "welfare of the city" (Jeremiah 29:4-7). Unlike the devouring nature of sinful humanity...God's kingdom, when it comes...even makes little pieces of land...better. Homes improve, creation moans a little less, streets get safer, drugs dry up, sirens come less often, blood spills less, devils search for homes elsewhere. It really is good news when the Kingdom of God has come...
We are currently putting in new carpet in our Nursery, classrooms and Children's ministry area. This is just a small reflection of the overall goodness that comes to town when Jesus shows up through His people. Now the little ones can crawl around and mommies wont worry what they might get from that old, nasty carpet that was clinging on for dear life. It's a good thing, carving out angels from the cold stone of our communities...sometimes its nothing spectacular...just paint, carpet, a wave of the hand, raking up some leaves...just life lived purposefully.
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