Back in February I was greatly encouraged by a quick notice given by the city of Newark. Usually when I am dealing with the city of Newark it is not a good thing. Municipal code enforcement, building inspections, parking tickets, etc. It involved our mayor Ras Baraka, pictured with NYC mayor Bill DeBlasio, where they were working out an agreement after NYC was sending its homeless population to Newark. The news I heard this time did not have the same media attention as that press conference though. It was about a reading program for the young people of Newark.
Every other week Mayor Baraka reads for the kids of Newark. This is great on its own, but this week the featured book was the 23rd Psalm illustrated by Tim Ladwig. The great thing about this book is the powerful Word of God is contextualized into an urban setting. Tim is on World Impact staff with TUMI and is an amazing artist. He has done the bulk of artwork for our TUMI materials, like Bible Blossom.
It was encouraging to me because as we empower urban leaders, here was a perfect example how someone much more influential than me—the Mayor—can use scripture and resources geared toward empowering urban leaders to raise the next generation that will write a story of Newark that hopefully looks more like the 23rd Psalm.
Please pray that God will continue to use World Impact’s work to reach further than we realize and use it to bring peace and hope to broken places in our cities. Pray for our church planter partners. Please pray also for me and my family that the Lord will continue to provide, protect, and guide us. Thank you for your prayers and financial support.
