“Recovered Body Identified as Second Missing Brother…” aligned the top of the headlines of a Columbus, Ohio news broadcast on a recent Saturday evening. I found myself zoning out — my mind traveled to a different place.
On the journey, I pictured a mother answering the door and staring face-to-face with a policeman. Although I could hear no dialogue, I envisioned the woman quivering and falling to her knees as the officer caught her in his arms. Instantly with this visit, her life was changed by chaos. Who would be there to help her? Who would show the love of Christ to her during this tragedy?
The next day, I received a text from my best friend.
“Liyah’s being rushed to the hospital. Please pray and meet us up there. She isn’t breathing!”
Frantically, I grabbed my wallet and keys and charged for the door; all the while simply saying the name of JESUS. As I released tears, I attempted to gather myself as I drove across town to the hospital. Less than an hour earlier, my dear friend of 23 years had met the enemy of chaos.
In ministry, we have so many parishioners among us, as well as community neighbors, who are met by chaos in their everyday lives. It could be a form of tragedy, or an overwhelming moment that handicaps a period of their lives. No matter the circumstance, or the person, chaos has the ability to attack and leave you breathless, defeated or scarred.
I am honored to be counted as one of the many servants working in full time ministry that can help create opportunities to resuscitate — declare victory — and even nurse the scars of the wounded. Doing ministry is such a privilege and it is essential for the times that we are living in. When terror and tragedy meet you at your front door, there has to be an answer in order for victory to be next in line at your door step. That victory is only found in Jesus. It is one of the church’s responsibilities to show Jesus in the midst of chaos. His strength is available to us in our weakest moments.
So my challenge to you today is to ask yourself, your staff and your clergy this question; How are we doing ministry for others in the midst of chaos?
What tragedies are happening among you that could allow opportunities for Christ to be revealed, for His love to be shown, for others to have a desire to serve Him? As Christians, we must shy away from looking for opportunities to share the love of God. We must boldly stand together to MAKE opportunities.
I encourage you today to not only pray when you hear of the tragic chain of events that are plaguing our country, states, cities and communities, but to ask Christ to show you ways to better serve in the midst of this chaos. I dare you to show His love and then see the triumph and victories that will take place, ultimately mending the aching hearts that could be at your neighbors’ doorsteps.
With ACS Technologies’ The City, we at New Covenant Believers’ Church have the opportunity here in Columbus to mobilize ministry to do just that. With a click of a few buttons, I am able to request groups that I am involved in to pray for my best friend’s 9 month-old child that laid in the hospital connected to a breathing machine. What were their responses? “What can we do to help?”
The next actions consisted of a friend posting a ‘Need’ on The City and a group that I belonged to catering food to my friend and her family while they were at the hospital. Others continued to pray and even contributed to a GoFundMe account that was established to help them pay for the baby’s medical bills.
In the end, this precious little girl breathed her last breath on Sunday, July 12 at 8:12 p.m. The following Monday at her Celebration of Life Service, a line that stretched more than a mile long aligned the church’s external doors. Among them, were ministry partners that were a part of my groups on The City. They had never met my best friend, her daughter and did not belong to their church. But they came. They came to do ministry. They came to show the love of Jesus. They came to breathe life into a breathless situation. They came to do ministry in the midst of chaos.
So although we can do absolutely nothing to bring back the two young men whose lives were taken in a senseless act, or that beautiful baby girl who stopped breathing in her sleep, we can use the tools afforded to us to mobilize ministry. We can find innovate ways to be the church and to do ministry. Despite no one from our ministry knowing the family that lost two sons within one week, we can still create a post on The City, discussing this horrible tragedy and coming together to do something special for the family, something special for strangers we do not know and who we have never connected with. But even in tragedy, we have an opportunity to show the love of Christ and the opportunity to do ministry in the midst of chaos.
Through The City, we organized efforts and did just that.
So after your staff answers the earlier posed question, please begin to make an effort to not only serve inside your ministry but also outside the walls of your church to bring ministry to others, even in the midst of chaos.
This blog was written by Kendrea A. Moorer, M.B.A. of New Covenant Believers’ Church in Columbus, Ohio.
