Those two words can be terrifying for most, but for me this is something that makes my heart so excited, it may sound morbid, but I have my reasons. The first one is going on a murder walk through some of the neighborhoods most recent murders makes the experience for our missions teams real. But also it gives us a chance to pray for the victims of the heinous crimes. The past two weeks we have had two different missions teams in town (that means its Summer Time in the City), and we’ve been on two different murder walks. This morning as we walked a police officer followed us to a few different sites, he seemed a little confused about what we might have been doing, we told him that we were loving our community through prayer for these victims and he told us about a few more murder sites within that block, and then he thanked us and told us to be safe.
As we stood at the last site this morning Ms. Jamie (a loved one) of one of the victims at the site we stood at, for a few minutes she just stood back and observed what we were doing. Then she walked away, came back and said to Matt and I thank you for what ya’ll are doing. I told her we were about to pray and invited her into our circle, that’s when she told us that her “homeboy” was one of the young men who were recently murdered. She said I watched you guys up on Frederick Ave. and followed you down here to see what you’re doing. She stood in the circle and listened to us beg for God to protect the neighborhood, as we asked for Satans hands to be bound in this neighborhood, and we begged for Hope to prevail. As we were about to close prayer Ms. Jamie spoke up and prayed one of the most powerful prayers, I have ever heard, she prayed blessings over us, she prayed for safety and protection, she prayed a prayer of Thanksgiving for us.
As we were finishing up, the front door of a home opened and the most precious little lady stepped out and in her hand she held the photo book that was handed out at the funeral of one of the young men gunned down and it was her grandson. She had no tears, only heartache that could have been felt for miles away. She told us that her grandson was in the neighborhood because she asked him to come visit her and he did. She didn’t want any prayer, but allowed us to love and hug her. She needed to be loved this morning, she wanted to share her story.
I have done the murder walk probably 10-15 times in the past year to year and a half and this is the most powerful walk I have been on, they have all been different, they have all been awesome, but to stand a the site of a recent murder and link arms with a “victim” and holding her.
This walk was exactly what this team needed, it was a reality check, it was a moment for their team to become more unified and it was a time for them to love a team member in a moment of reality. I spent some time thanking God this afternoon for that moment and pray for more moments like this through out the week!
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