It was nearly noon on Good Friday. With feelings of both expectancy and trepidation, we were about to call Chicago again. This moment was the culmination of nine long months of waiting and working toward the purchase of an abandoned house on Girard Street that would become Sojourners' neighborhood center. Calls to the house's owner in Chicago had increased in the last few weeks as his signing of the settlement papers had been delayed over and over.
In our eight years in inner-city Washington, D.C., Sojourners community has never had its own space for local ministries. Daycare for children, housing work, a food co-op, and emergency food distribution have all taken place in rented space or our homes. This has restricted the scope of our ministry and made it difficult for our neighbors to identify us as a church.
We often find that we cannot store all of the food given to us for emergency distribution. We do not have space for large tenant meetings with our neighbors, and our neighborhood prayer and Bible study are confined to our small living rooms. We have no private offices for hearing tenants' housing problems or receiving commodity food applications, or a center for building on relationships with neighborhood children that began at summer camp. A major factor in the closing of our day-care center was the excessive rent we paid for its space, and now we are losing the three-room basement apartment that houses our neighborhood offices and the Southern Columbia Heights Tenants Union because the building above it is being sold.
As our neighbors experience an expanding crisis brought on by the government's abandonment of their needs, we have been forced to face the crisis with shrinking space for ministry. Thus, the house on Girard Street came to represent not only our dreams but also the key to our deeper involvement in our city and the struggles of the poor. But it felt like a birth that would not happen.
The weeks leading up to Holy Week were permeated with the remembrance of Christ's death, along with the possibility of the death of our hopes and dreams. By Good Friday, everything was ready--we had just one month before we had to be out of our offices, a local prayer community contributed the funds to begin the extensive renovation on the house, and 12 students from Calvin College in Michigan (who seemed predestined to show up at just the right moment) were on their way to spend their week of spring break working on the house.
Finally we called Chicago one last time. We made some last-minute concessions, and the papers were signed. Shock that it finally happened gave way to the busyness of owning the house--community members and neighbors who had been anxiously waiting and praying were given the good news, the insurance company was informed, the power company was alerted, and our funding appeal letter which had taken up semi-permanent residence with the printing company was finally sent out to friends.
Easter morning arrived with freshness and new hope. Holy Week's clouds and rain lifted just in time for our sunrise service, and as the sun peeked over the horizon we celebrated Christ's resurrection as well as his faithfulness to us in our struggles and dreams.
Monday morning the void and silence of an abandoned house surrendered to activity and was filled with life. Inside walls and part of the roof were pulled down, window frames were scraped and painted, dead bushes were cut away, the grass was cut, and an estimated 12 tons of trash were hauled away. Children and teenagers from the block appeared that day to enter in, and neighbors stopped by to see what had come. The clouds and rain returned that week, but they were unable to dampen the spirit of hope and joy we felt.
Our new neighborhood center is a large, 70-year old, three-story house that was destined to become a luxurious single-family dwelling, until a fire struck five years ago in the middle of renovation. Sixty thousand dollars' worth of rehabilitation is needed to bring it up to safety standards and make it a structure that will meet our needs.
As we cross the planks on the porch and duck the hanging eves, we enter what will be a large assembly area for tenant meetings, neighborhood events, shared meals, and prayer and worship. At the back of the first floor is a large kitchen, where we can prepare hot breakfasts or family suppers. The basement will contain our food distribution center, a joint project with our neighbors.
Climbing to the second floor we find a large front room that will be perfect for children's program--tutoring, recreation, and Bible study. There will also be offices on this floor for family counseling and space for parents groups to meet.
The third floor will contain our housing ministry, with the Southern Columbia Heights Tenants Union's office. The large room at the front has lovely eves that reach the floor; there is no doubt in anyone's mind that this is our chapel.
New life came to us in a very tangible way this Easter. We are at the early stages of gathering resources for rehabilitation of the house, and the progress may be slow and tedious. Our faith and patience will continue to be stretched as we begin rehabilitation with the faith that funding will continue to come in to complete the project.
Our neighborhood center has already been a gift in bringing us friends with whom to share our prayer and struggles. Others are starting to respond, and offers of help are beginning to shape our summer. The center will also carry a challenge for us to be more present and involved personally and as a community in our neighborhood. This too will be a gift.
Gayle Turner was a member of Sojourners Fellowship and worked with Sojourners Housing Ministry when this article appeared.
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