On June 26th, Mark Zimmerman traveled to The Union Project in Pittsburgh for the Jesus for President tour.  Chris Haw (L) and Shane Claiborne (R), the authors of Jesus for President (Zondervan 2008) talk with Mark Zimmerman outside The Union Project in Pittsburgh (photo by Anna Zimmerman) about the book, the tour and what they’ve been learning.

Interview Part 1
Interview Part 2
Interview Part 3

If you’d like to see how CNN covered the Pittsburgh tour stop, click for video here… or you can read about it here.

If you want to follow Shane and Chris and the Jesus for President tour you can read their blog here.

Recently, I met Esperance Barinakandi at the English as a Second Language (ESL) class run by Building Hope in the City. As we talked, Esperance began to tell me a story that has been repeated tens of thousands of times in the political/religious/ethnic hurricane that is the continent of Africa.

As we talked, I asked Esperance if she would sit with me sometime and record her story. When we did, I sensed moments as we recorded that I was “coming too close” to events that she did not care to relate at that time…and I backed off. What you cannot see from listening to the audio, were the small tears at the corner of Esperance’s eyes as she talked her way through what we did speak of. Photos by Anna Zimmerman.

As a believer, I often wonder how I would respond to true persecution. I wonder how I would respond to true trials. I invite you to listen to the story of Esperance’s family…persecution…trial…and joy.

Part 1…Refugees…from Burundi to Tanzania

Part 2…Coming to America

Part 3…Today - and Tomorrow

SOME NOTES FOR THOSE UNFAMILIAR WITH AMERICA’S “NEW REFUGEES”

Imagine for a moment that you are in the situation that Esperance’s family faced over the last 15 years…how do you think you would respond to -

…leaving the centuries-old home of your family…with nothing but what you could carry?

…facing death because of you tribe, Christian faith…or both?

…spending 11 years living in a tent?

…having to find your own food in a foreign land when the UN missed a delivery to your camp, forgot, or had your delivery hijacked by rebels?

…wondering if God had forgotten you?

Then, suppose the State Department of the United States of America had seen your case, and reacted favorably? Suppose you then had to -

…travel thousands of miles on your first ever ride on an airplane?

…come to a place where the temperature in December is 80 degrees BELOW what you’re used to?

…learn a completely new language and set of customs?

…learn what the following “essentials” of Western society are for - grocery stores, banks, electricity, plumbing, social service agencies, appliances, automobiles…(shall I continue)?

AND WITH ALL OF THAT…LET’S ADD THIS:

You have 180 DAYS to become self-sufficient in this foreign land. After that, your aid from the US Government drops off dramatically.

180 days. Could you do it?

Could you help someone do it?

Visit Building Hope in the City and let them know you would like to help. It’s not about giving cash, making meals, or writing checks…it’s about giving your time. It may be frustrating, and sometimes difficult, but it may be the best chance America’s new immigrants will have to successfully assimilate into American society.

The church on the Building Hope in the City campus is Trinity Lutheran. It was built in 1873…by refugees and immigrants. Those builders were the ones who welcomed our great-grandparents generation to this country…the next wave of immigrant and refugees. 135 years later, the church still stands, and now we are the ones charged with receiving our brothers and sisters who coming to America…may we do it as faithfully as those who came before us.

Next time: some numbers from 2007 on the refugees who have come to the City of Cleveland.

For more information on the situation in Africa these two books have given me a better awareness the first is God Grew Tired of Us by John Bul Dau (there is also a documentary film by the same name) and the second is A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ismael Beah

The other guys that are working with Saddleback to blog/webcast the gathering include DJ Chuang, Carlos Whittaker and Josh Griffin and Tony Morgan. The live webcasts will be hosted here on Ustream. Here’s a list of the guys that are participating in the event including folks like Mark Driscoll, Kerry Shook, Dave Ferguson, Mark Beeson, Jud Wilhite, Jonathan Falwell and Miles McPherson. It is an interesting gathering.

tom roepke, pastor of students at new hope community church in loudonville church is also attending and is blogging about the summit here.

for more information on how you can take part in Fresh Coat Cleveland visit their website here, email Leah Richards or call 216-281-7919 x209

Mark Zimmerman recorded this piece (click here to hear) on his recent trip to the Love & Hope Children’s Home in Nejapa, El Salvador. The 11-minute piece gives you a “sound picture” Love & Hope…a ministry that is far more than an orphanage…it’s an oasis in a small Central American country. (SPECIAL NOTE FOR ALL TECHNOGEEKS…with the exception of Mark’s voice-overs and the small clip of music from Jesus Adrian Romero at the conclusion, all audio in the piece was recorded using a Marantz PMD620 palm-sized digital recorder…big sound from a tiny source!)

March 4, 1908 was a cold, clear day in Collinwood. It was Ash Wednesday.

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The majority of the families living in Collinwood were immigrants, first – or at the most – second-generation Americans from central Europe

At 5714 Sackett Avenue 14-year-old Louise, 8-year-old John, 5-year-old George, and their baby sister Emma saw their father leave for work. Then George and Emma waved goodbye to their older sister and brother as they headed off toward what was known as Lake View School. Classes began as normal – with prayer – at 8:45 on that cold March morning.

The steam heating system in the basement of the school was pushing as much heat as it could into the classrooms. But at some point that morning, inside the walls of the school, a hot steam pipe lay against wooden joists…and the uninsulated pipe touching dry wood started a joist smoldering…and that grew into a flame.

The school building’s exterior was of masonry construction, while the entire interior was made of wood. That, added to the design of the building’s main staircase quickly turned the staircase into a wooden chimney, and the flames shot upward with intensity and speed. The panic sent children spilling into the hallways already filled with smoke, running for the stairwells…that were already in flames. The Collinwood and Cleveland fire department’s horse-drawn wagons were speeding to the scene…but it was already too late.

The building was filled with flames, and smoke, and the screams of children. From homes, businesses, and factories around Collinwood, people rushed to the scene… but they could only get there in time to see children leaping to their death from second and third-story windows.

With some of the upper door panels busted out, some parents tried to pull their children to safety through the openings…only to watch their children die from the fire…or die from suffocation – the bodies were packed so tightly at the doors…

We have no way of knowing when or how Louise and John’s mother and father found out about the death of their first child born in Germany, or their second, born in America, or how they told his younger brother and baby sister that Louise and John would never come home. But for them…as for the families of the other 170 children of Collinwood, it was to be a day of unimaginable grief …and unanswerable questions. How do innocent lives get cut so short…in such a preventable way? How do parents survive the horror of a child’s death? George and Emma’s mother and father had very little money…like most in the neighborhood, they knew expensive burials were out of the question. They chose to bury Louise and John in a common grave with their classmates at Lake View Cemetery where the memorial remains to this day.

Funerals and gravesite completely paid for by the churches of Collinwood

On Ash Wednesday, March 4, 1908, none of the parents of those 172 children had any inkling when they kissed their children and sent them off to school, that it would be the last time they would see them alive.

So what will the morning of March 4, 2008 be like…as each of our families go our separate ways? Don’t leave any hugs unhugged, and kisses unkissed, or any “I love you’s” unsaid…We may not know what today holds…but we know Who holds today. March 4, 1908 is most certainly a date that George, Emma, and their mother and father would have started differently if they had known that it would the last morning they would see Louise and John alive…Louise and John Zimmerman…the great-aunt and great-uncle I never met.

George, my grandfather, died when I was 5 years old…and great-aunt Emma was an infant that day, so the information I have on the fire has come from libraries and the internet…but as a believer in Christ, one thing I learn more and more every day is the brevity of life – that our time here is limited.

Yes, roosters crow at midnight. …and at 2am, 3am, 4am, 4:01am…you get the idea.

It was a week unlike any other. Some highlights:

• 26 children who are having Jesus built into their lives by the Word and the way their mommy and poppy live their lives. That said, all is not angelic…they are after all, kids. They have their moments as all kids do…but 90 percent of the moments with these kids are pure joy. That’s amazing, considering that 90 percent of them have come from situations where they were suffering abuse or neglect at the hands of those who were supposed to love them most.

10 other men who were working the building project. Almost all were from Cuyahoga Community Church, and all were real men - and real men of God. That’s a powerful combination.

• 2 papusas consumed…the papusa is El Salvador’s national favorite. It’s a thick, hand-made, hollowed out tortilla…in this case, filled with refried beans and cheese, and topped with a mild red sauce. Muchisimas gracias, Senorita Rosa!
• 1 spirit-filled couple. Mauricio is Salvadoran. Rachel is American. Together, they realized about 5 years ago that their dream was the same, the children they loved were the same, and…oh yeah, they loved each other, too.

Along with loving the kids, we also had the opportunity to feed “the community.” The community is made up of those in the region who lost everything in the 2003 earthquakes. The government promised housing, and a place to live. The government delivered corrugated metal, wooden poles, and a dusty plain with no electricity or water supply.

The cooks at Love & Hope work extra hours to provide food for well over 250 people. Mauricio is the preacher…and the praise team. There’s a generator to power a couple of speakers, and those of us who have hopped into the back of the pickup to go and serve what may be the best meal these people get all week.

As I watched, and then served the rice…I realized I might just be a part of the church at its most organic level. Look at Matthew 14.13 - and then Matthew 15.29…lots of ministry - then feed the people. I also thought about something else…there were a lot more people there to eat, than there were to hear Mauricio’s preaching. Did that happen in Jesus’ time, too? I wonder…

Everyone had to bring their own plate, and as I placed the rice on the plates that came in front of me, I noticed that some weren’t whole plates. By the time I was reaching the end of the line…they weren’t even plates. At the end, I was filling torn-off corners of used plastic bags. As I write this, having just had some soup in a nice, matching Pfalzgraff bowl and spoon…yes, I’m still thinking about it.

It was also at Love & Hope that I learned something important about servanthood.

My teacher’s name was Lissette. She’s around 6 years old, is missing one of her front teeth, and loves to pose if a camera is pointed in her direction.

She also knows how to be a blessing in the sweetest and simplest of ways.

At meals, she would position herself where our feeding line began. She would hand us each our fork, and make sure we had our plate. When the meal concluded, she gathered the plates, carefully stacked the cups, and wiped the countertop. That done, she had a broom in hand, and worked next to the kitchen ladies to help clean.

On Friday…the hottest day of the week, I ditched my shoes and socks at lunchtime, and worked the afternoon in my sandals. By 4pm, I was a sweaty mess with a bruised hip after pulling too hard on an axe handle…that gave way. And that’s when it happened:

As I sat in the shade, sipping my Gatorade, Lissette came up to me and smiled. “Hola, Lissette. Como estas?” I asked.

She bent down and tugged at the velcro on my left sandal strap, got it open…and pulled my sandal off. She did the same with the right, and then -

Lissette began brushing the dirt and motar dust off my feet…with her hands.

Like you, I have read John 13.1-5 many times in my life.

Like you, I have marveled that the King of the universe would do the job of the lowliest servant.

Like you, I saw it as a wonderful story.

After she had brushed the dust from my feet, Lissette carefully pushed the dust off my sandals as well.

I thought for the briefest of moments about stopping her - that she didn’t have to do that - but what would I have have said? How could I have explained the complexity of the irony, the object lesson, and my own emotions with a Spanish vocabulary that was pretty much limited to the weather, the food, and knowing where the bathroom was?

When she was finished, and my cleaned sandals were on my cleaned feet, she looked up at me and smiled. I held out my arms, and we hugged a long time.

“Gracias, Lissette. Muchas gracis.” was about all I could manage.

Someday, I hoped, I’ll be able to tell her just what a “Jesus moment” she had given me. Someday, I thought, I’ll be able to properly thank her. But then I knew -

…that on that day, when I’m able to tell her so that she will understand, I will be kneeling next to Lissette at the the foot of His throne, and I won’t need to say a word. I’ll just listen as He takes Lissette’s hand and says -

“Well done, thou good and faithful servant…”

In the early morning hours of November 16th, I opened my eyes and stared at a cold metal ceiling that I didn’t immediately recognize.

To my left were a group of homeless people…sound asleep.

To my right was…Tom Roepke?

Then it all came back…I was in the fellowship hall of Trinity Lutheran Church, last night had been 2 live broadcasts of 1 Night on the Street, and now, in about an hour, I was back on the air again. Dozens of church ministries had come together to make this event happen, hundreds had been fed the night before, an impromptu worship service had even broke out between services.

I was laying on the platform, covered by a blanket, feeling really good about everything that had happened in the last 12 hours…

“Hey,” said one of the homeless guys, “you snore.”

Ahh, humility.

It has been 6 weeks since 1 Night on the Street, and a few days ago in northern Minnesota, I laid in a cabin bunk (underneath that same blanket) at Miracle Bible Camp on a 6 below zero Chistmas Eve and thought about all that had happened.

The phone calls and emails are still flowing. Individuals, Bible studies, families, even whole churches have come alongside city ministries to be Jesus hands and feet.

Ministry is happening.

Thanks to you. Thanks be to God.

And thanks to some wonderful people who responded to an interesting idea last spring: Tom Roepke…has created and administered this site, and has been quite a friend during this journey we find ourselves on. Dick Lee…and the whole team at WCRF - thanks for coming along with all your support. Pastors Joe Abraham, Juri Ammari, Robert Powell, and Dean Van Farowe - you painted the picture of city ministry so well during the Pastor’s Forum - may God bless your ministries and draw us together again soon. Joe Sanson…for feeding the multitudes, see you soon in El Salvador, amigo! Captain Randy Orr…thank you for allowing us to serve in your Army for just a little while. Julie Busch and her team of volunteers from Bay Presbyterian Church took all the phone calls during the event…Bay Pres has been working in the city for years, and if every church could mobilize like this group, there would never need to be a 1 Night on the Street! There are so many more people I could thank, but I’ll conclude with my friends at Trinity Lutheran Church: Pastor Jeff Johnson, Brian Upton, Ellen Steinberg, and all the Building Hope in the City volunteers who kept me worry-free on the site.

Now comes the hard part…keeping the momentum going!

If you haven’t volunteered yet…go for it! 2008 is a great time to begin a new ministry chapter for yourself and your family. Keep those stories coming, I enjoy reading them and posting them.

1 Night on the Street - Akron?

I’ll think about it…when I’m sleeping in someone else’s bed again - January 12-20 at the Love & Hope Children’s Home in Nejapa, El Salvador.

Saludos amigos - Mark