REFLECTIONS: BY BRUCE MAIN

“Bruce, I think Albert is feeling a little bit down,” said one of our staff members the other afternoon.

The next day when I saw him I asked, “How’s it going, Al? I could see he was not his usual up-beat self.

“Bruce, I’m worried, there’s a new drug operation just outside the church where we have our Club. There were junkies shooting up the other day just where our kids could see what was going down. What do you think we should do?”

Albert is an incredible young man who directs our North Camden After School program. He practically grew up in UrbanPromise as one of our most enthusiastic students—started when he was six year’s old—then attended our summer camps, was employed during his teen years as a great StreetLeader, and then went to Eastern University on a scholarship. After graduation Albert felt compelled to give back to his old neighborhood. “People came from all over the world as Volunteers to help me,” he always likes to share. “I just wanted to give back...kids relate to me and my story. I made it, now they can see how they can make it too.”

As we talked we explored some options of how Albert might approach the drug dealer: calling the police would only bring retribution, doing nothing would be detrimental to our kids. “I’m going to have a talk with that guy who runs that operation,” concluded my young friend.

Later that week Albert burst into my office. “Bruce, Bruce, I talked to the guy who runs the corner,” he began. “I asked him if he could move his operation somewhere else. I told him how I was trying to set an example for the little kids in the community.” Albert paused. “Right away the guy started to yell at his crew to clear the corner. Apologetically he told me that he would have them out of there by two o’clock.”

Albert then looked at me and asked curiously, “Bruce, did we ever have a guy named Jeff work here about--15 years ago?”

I dug back into my memory. “Fifteen years ago...yea, we did have a guy on staff named...Jeff. Yes, I remember he was an intern from Southern California, graduated from USC as I remember. He’d spent a number of years with UrbanPromise before going into teaching. Everybody liked him. Why do you ask?”

“Strange, but that dealer asked me if a guy named Jeff still worked at UrbanPromise. The dealer also told me that he had been part of UrbanPromise when he was in fifth grade and Jeff was his favorite counselor.”

Later, I mused on why our local drug pusher hadn’t turned out like Albert—a college graduate, one who had come back to the city to positively change his community. Instead, this nameless twenty seven year old had slipped through the cracks and ended up a drug dealer—yet a dealer who chose to apologetically shut down his operations so that young kids could safely enter our After School Center.

I don’t yet know that drug dealer’s name. But I will find out. Then, hopefully, and by God’s grace, I will have a chance to bring him up to date on the good things happening in Jeff’s life, and how those things could happen in his. For I believe the end of this sad story, this perplexing, brief encounter, has not yet been fully written. Our God continues to move in mysterious and exciting ways and writes miraculous stories.