The City Beautiful
Rhonda Stapleton (2004) received a Master of Divinity from Asbury Seminary.
Orlando, “the City Beautiful,” is the tourist capital of the world and was the travel destination of some 46,586,000 visitors in 2009. The top twelve area theme parks hosted 74,098,000 guests last year. But the Orlando I’ve come to know and love does not make the Chamber of Commerce brochure or the Official Visitors Bureau statistics. Instead, my Orlando sits just across the tracks from the heart of the city and is light-years from the enchantment of Magic Kingdom. Its statistics are measured in terms of crime, abandoned homes and failing schools.
God led me to Orlando eight years ago to serve with an urban ministry and live in community with people who are marginalized from society. Immediately, I had a sense of peace that this was exactly where I belonged although I knew nothing of city life. I grew up in rural Eastern Kentucky and resented people who breezed in to fix our problems. They didn’t know us; how could they even know if there was a problem? I didn’t want to be one of those people in my new neighborhood. The most important thing I could do was simply to show up—be a learner, a neighbor. As urban ministers, we don’t have all the answers; in fact, we don’t even know the questions. Until we earn the right to live among the people we serve, we have no license to speak into their situations. Gaining trust takes time. Offering hope presumes a lifestyle of consistency and Godly obedience.
I love my city. Every day I encounter Jesus in “his many distressing disguises,” as Mother Teresa said. I learn so much about God’s grace and mercy through interacting with my neighbors. I am consistently challenged to love my neighbor as myself—especially when my neighbor is the drug dealer on the corner or the man who comes under the cover of darkness to solicit sex from a despondent daughter of the King.
While many people have abandoned the neighborhood thus creating a ghetto, God has remained faithful. He loves this neighborhood and the people who inhabit it. When I first moved to Orlando, my paradigm was challenged. I heard gunshots and police helicopters. I saw prostitutes “catch a date” and drug dealers sell openly in the light of day. I smelled poverty and tasted injustice. These were not my life experiences, yet God broadened my understanding of his love for his children.
Little did I know that my first incident of seeing a prostitute meet up with her date just outside my front door would open my eyes to the very avenue for ministry to which God called me in The City Beautiful. As I got to know the ladies on The Trail, I learned their stories. As Chaplain to women in Orange County Corrections, I heard more stories and began to feel their pain. God was performing a heart transplant – trading a weakly beating vessel for a new heart with love for God’s daughters caught up in a vicious cycle of hopelessness and despair. The vast majority of these women had experienced abuse early in life. Many had unspeakable crimes committed against them before they ever engaged in criminal activity or destructive lifestyle patterns. The injustice stared me in the face as if daring me to act.
In 2009, God called me to lay the foundation for Samaritan Village, a transition house for women who desire freedom from the bondage and peril of addiction and street life. Samaritan Village will provide structure, practical life skills and Biblical truths to help ladies discover—maybe for the first time—their true selves. More importantly, they will meet the Messiah as did the Samaritan woman at the well in Sychar. As their lives are transformed, they will take the message of hope into their communities and invite their people to come and see for themselves this Christ who gives new life.
Starting with nothing but a God-inspired vision, we now have space for a resale boutique, appropriately named Transitions, to help fund the ministry and employ women starting over. We are praying for the perfect property to house ladies in a safe area of town. God shows up daily, proving the lengths he will go to save his children.
I love my city.
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