By Jim Herbst
A few years ago it was the beginning of what I now call “the human hunting season” in our neighborhood. As temperatures rise in the spring, criminal activity and turf battles also heat up. The warm spring nights are pierced with gunfire.
I lay in bed during this annual cycle with tears at our church”s inability to make much of a difference. I learned a simple and often repeated prayer: “Help!”
I”ve prayed that prayer in bed, in daily devotions, with fasting, on my knees, flat on my face, driving, on the church”s balcony, on the church”s roof, staring out my bedroom window, walking through the neighborhood, jogging””anywhere and everywhere.
Quick Responses
Sometimes God answers very quickly. At a summer prayer meeting, an elder expressed concern about the tensions that were rising in his part of the neighborhood as he left home. Tempers were flaring between rival groups of teens. Threats were flying. All the signs pointed toward a violent clash. I remember the intensity of his prayers for the safety of his family and neighbors.
When prayer ended it was pouring down rain. The streets were clear. God heard his prayers.
One Saturday our leaders discussed a large hole in the plaster at the front of the auditorium. We didn”t have the resources to fix it, but we prayed for help. The next day a first-time guest handed me his business card with contact information. He was a professional plasterer. His family became one of the hardest-working in our church, and today the hole is fixed.
Sometimes God shows his sense of humor. I once randomly prayed for God to send $100,000. Within three days I received information from my alumni association about a $100,000 life insurance policy. There is, of course, a minor catch to life insurance policies: you must die before they pay off!
Prayer Struggles
Most prayers, however, have not had such quick or dramatic responses. Some have taken so long I forgot I even prayed them. Prayer can be a struggle for me. In life”s difficulties I sometimes find it easier to address God as a distant “Lord” than as “Father.” It seems every big success comes only after a series of failures. In periods of weak faith, sometimes “Help!” is the only thing I can get out. Nevertheless, it has been a powerful prayer.
For four years, our church”s leaders and I had labored one-on-one with some of the most broken in our city. We helped carry their burdens””providing transportation, giving financial help, buying groceries, hosting them in our homes, diffusing hostile situations, being advocates in the legal and medical systems, and even helping with pets. We had a fair number of baptisms, but when we began shifting responsibility for managing their lives back to them as individuals, they often disappeared.
I believe in Jesus” commitment to the poor, but I hated coming home to all the requests on my answering machine. Church attendance had plateaued. We were surviving financially, but only by putting off important expenses.
The summer of 2004 we had four shootings resulting in two deaths on my block alone. By the time of our congregational meeting in November, I knew something needed to change within our church or I needed to quit.
The climax came in January 2005 when I did a funeral for a neighbor”s 18-year-old son, Scott, who had been murdered in connection to drugs. Although the funeral itself went very well, I felt a horrible emptiness that we had no follow-up programs to offer. Our normal churchy programs were culturally disconnected from where Scott”s family was spiritually.
I prayed that simple prayer “Help!” with even greater desperation. I specifically prayed that in the future we would be able to have a greater impact on Scott”s younger sisters than we did on him.
No Other Prayer
Usually I don”t even know what to pray for other than “help.” One needed change was in the church bylaws. God provided a retired attorney named Doug who was an elder at another church. He filed amended articles of incorporation and worked with us to rewrite the bylaws. After a year-and-a-half process, the changes passed with only one dissenting vote. Thus, God answered another prayer that began with “Help!”
As much as I dislike building maintenance, I couldn”t ignore the deterioration indefinitely, so we prayed. A contact from another church, Suzy, referred us to the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation. The foundation declined our request for a grant, but provided a free consultation with a contractor. The resulting evaluation gave us a list of projects we could tackle ourselves.
The list was incredibly helpful, but overwhelming. We prayed for help. Without knowing our situation, three separate leaders approached me about bringing work groups. It took two years, but God answered the prayer and we worked through the list.
To address the larger issues, the contractor recommended a capital campaign. I wasn”t confident about how much our inner-city church of 45 could raise. A number of our members live on less than $1,000 per month. To my memory the largest special offering we had ever received was $800, so I threw out a goal of $1,100, expecting maybe $2,000, and we prayed for help.
After nine months of preparation we took the offering on May 21, 2006. The total came to $9,339.61 in actual gifts. I fought to hold back the tears. I realize it is pocket change to most churches, but among the poor it was phenomenal. A low-income senior was thrilled to give up her morning coffee money because she had nothing else to give. Others gave up their tax refunds and put off much-needed purchases until the following year. It didn”t cover all the building projects, but it gave us a start.
Blessings and Roadblocks
We also knew we needed a more strategic approach to outreach and the neighborhood”s social problems. We needed outside resources, skills, and accountability. We prayed. In June 2005 we started a separate nonprofit, Urban Fuel Inc., “to fuel Christian leadership and community development.” Our target project was to run a special events coffeehouse where we pay neighborhood youth to staff the events and teach them business skills in the process. God blessed us with incredible advisers and a board of directors.
After initial success we ran into one roadblock after another. Hurricane Katrina hit just weeks after we submitted our 501(c)(3) application to the Internal Revenue Service. A four-month process slowed to a 10-month process as, understandably, the government fast-tracked Gulf region requests. We prayed and our application was eventually approved. During the delay we missed an important grant deadline and were rejected by another. Several potential funders backed out. We prayed for help. With no prior contact, a church smaller than us gave us a $10,000 donation.
We spent three months advertising our nine-month youth training program to the neighborhood. The program was well received by neighborhood leaders, our business community, and social work consultants, but the August 1, 2006, deadline came and went without a single application submitted from youth.
We prayed. We decided to plan a grand opening event and to pay seven youth from the church and neighborhood to work. On October 6, 2006, we had our grand opening event with more than 130 people, mostly from the neighborhood; among those present was the president of Pittsburgh City Council. The very first worker we paid was the younger sister of Scott””the boy murdered in January 2005. We were then contacted by other interested neighborhood youth. God answered another prayer.
Don”t get the wrong impression. If you”d visit our place you wouldn”t find anything close to a Starbucks or a café in a megachurch””not on our budget. But an influential neighborhood organization offered to pay our youth to provide coffee and cookies to their monthly meetings and other events, which included a reception with the mayor. Pittsburgh”s fire chief also was there, and he said they were the best cookies he”s ever had.
Touching God’s Heart
This simple prayer “Help!” isn”t a formula for personal success. Usually I end up with something very different than what I had in mind when I prayed. The church is growing, but we”re still treading water with problems””just better problems than we had a few years ago.
I can say with great certainty, however, that the simple prayer “Help”””when prayed in brokenness, humility, and submission””seems to touch the heart of a merciful God.
Jim Herbst ministers with Hazelwood Christian Church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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