The Glorious Mess of Community

In 1989, Glen Schrieber saw a deep need for the gospel in New Orleans and felt called to serve in an urban setting. He and his family moved there and started a youth sports ministry that would eventually become Urban Impact, an inner-city student ministry, focused on making a transformational gospel impact.  

Glen partnered with pastor John Gerhardt to build the ministry; and together, they discipled many students, including Tyrone Christoph, Urban Impact’s youth pastor. Eventually, as the ministry grew, Glen passed the baton to John, and John continued to disciple Tyrone and brought him into leadership.  

Today, Urban Impact has 175 children involved in weekly ministry, 345 children involved in summer camp and has hosted, trained and sent 20,000 short-term missionaries. This year, we spoke with Glen, John and Tyrone about the early days of Urban Impact, the challenges and rewards of ministry and how they’re continuing to develop leaders and multiply disciplemakers to advance the gospel in New Orleans.  

EFCA: What challenges did you face when starting Urban Impact? 

Glen Schrieber: I didn't know what it was going to become. There was no name; there was just a place. [My wife and I] were just two Nebraska kids. We didn't know anything about New Orleans. We didn't know anyone. We didn't even know how to get anything started. We just did a lot of prayer walking and did a lot of networking. We put together a plan through tears, walking by a playground and saying, “God, I don't know what You want to do with this white Protestant Midwest kid who doesn't know anybody here in this particular city.” The youth in the housing developments called back all kinds of feelings that I had as a youth, feeling lost and left out. I had a nice family, and I still was struggling with identity, still struggling with where I fit in this world. So, with that bit of empathy, and knowing the challenges that the city was addressing, [I wondered] how do I enter it?  

John Gerhardt: I think you sell yourself short. You plowed the hard ground. How do you grow plants out of concrete? What you did was bust up concrete by building relationships that then created soil that could take some seed. It was your vision to take kids to the Kids Across America camp for inner city youth. That was a springboard for the three of us being around this table. 

EFCA: How did you build relationships with people in the neighborhood? 

Glen: I showed up with my three oldest boys, and eventually the ministry started with twelve 12-year-olds. If I could show that I'm not a one-and-done-guy, then I could start to get to know the parents and some of the players in the community. Basically, the more I showed up, the more relationships formed. 

Tyrone Christoph: Putting in the time was what earned the trust of the community. Even now, what we're doing, all of that comes off the backs of all those years of ministry, because we've been there for the long haul.  

John: There's power in presence and persistence, more than programs; programs come along for the ride. If people are the priority, then it's a long-haul gig.  

EFCA: What was the community like and what is the community like today? 

Glen: Well, the community has changed drastically from when we first walked in. It was your typical U.S. housing development project. It was a four-story, multifamily building that stretched for four blocks with a courtyard in the middle, where people would gather and kids would play. It just teemed with people.  

John: If you look at the community, we have got to be honest, it was rough. In 1995, [there were] 495 murders that year. Again, whenever people look at the inner city, they see that. Poverty, drugs, violence. They don't see the hearts of the people. They don't see [Tyrone’s] mom. They don't see what an amazing lady she is.  

Tyrone: Yeah, you hear about the crime and the violence, but there's parents, like my mom, who worked hard to provide for their kids and their families. 

John: And the cool thing, to fast forward, Tyrone now runs our youth ministry. He's pouring into Santana [part-time ministry assistant at Urban Impact]. He's pouring into another Tyrone [part-time ministry assistant at Urban Impact]. And he's doing it better than I did. That's the payoff. It's a beautiful place with beautiful people.  

Glen: You had the kids playing double-dutch and football and basketball and hopscotch and all that. To come into that was a gift for us to receive. 

John: [Tyrone’s] job is harder. 

Glen: Yeah, that’s right.  

John: Cause there aren’t as many kids, and there aren’t that many hanging out playing. We could just walk the projects and ask, “You want to go to camp?” 

Glen: [Today] those projects have been torn down and rebuilt into less dense housing, so the courtyards aren't quite as dynamic as they once were.  

Tyrone: I think there's a lot more things striving for their attention. Social media. School. Tons of kids aren’t hanging out like they used to. It's a different age.  

EFCA: John, you mentioned Tyrone is pouring into two other leaders. How do you know when it’s the right time to give them more leadership responsibilities? 

Tyrone: I probably should have gotten fired early on.  

John: Yeah, you should have. [Laughs] When you're doing this kind of ministry, a lot of it's a crock pot. It takes time. Some of it is like Romans 12, do things that are proportionate to your faith. We let people do stuff and make mistakes; we have a willingness to release people to do ministry and walk them through it rather than say, “Hey, we're going to make you perfect,” or “We're going to get this so well-oiled that when you start, it’s going to be great.” We're more like, “Alright, let's go.” Would you agree?  

Tyrone: Yeah. You’re always pushing me to take chances on people. Because you never know what God's going to do. You have got to look past yourself. Even when stuff blew up, all I could do was pray. And look what God has done. 

John: If you don't take that chance, you lose the opportunity. So let's just take that opportunity. We would rather have the opportunity with the mess, than lose the opportunity of looking for perfection or looking for them to get their act together to a level that makes them ready for ministry. 

Tyrone: Just look at [the apostle] Peter.  

Glen: Yeah, Peter’s heart was right. Ministry wise, we were all a hot mess, because we didn't really know what we were doing. The creativity and the commitment that we needed to draw on just to step into that situation was part of our DNA from the start. For urban ministry, particularly, you don't clock out of it. You live in the neighborhood. It's your neighborhood. You're developing family and community. You're doing that together. 

John: The glorious mess that community is. If we don't take the risk, we don't have the glorious mess of community. 

EFCA: How have you seen “glorious community” at Urban Impact? 

John: Johnny Bailey [a former student at Urban Impact] talks about camp in the 90s, when we went up and we almost got kicked out of the hotel because we brought kids to stay in a hotel who have never been out of the city. He talks about it like it was yesterday. And he said, “I remember I got to swim. Man, that was the biggest pool I've ever seen in my life. And I got to go on the blob and there were canoes. But I've never canoed ever again in my life. I want my son to be a part of it.” So now he brings Johnny Jr. 

Glen: John and I have the gift of looking back and knowing the desires we had for the youth, to be able to enjoy what we've been able to enjoy, which is a wonderful marriage and family and homeownership and being in a job that you didn't have to do, but you wanted to do it. We’ve been able to see the different guys that have grown up and are doing that. 

John: And faith is intertwined in that. But the coolest thing about leadership development is this: Glen passed the baton to me. We're getting ready to pass more of the baton to Tyrone. Tyrone's training Tyrone King to be a youth pastor. Man, he's teaching how many lessons for us at SLAM [the middle school ministry at Urban Impact that stands for “Serving, Learning, and Maturing”]? 

Tyrone: He just did almost a month.  

John: We’ve had 14 kids accept Christ since December 15 and some of those were with him preaching.  

Tyrone: I just want to be pouring into people so that when it’s time to pass the baton there's no gap and no fall off. You just got to have that love for people. I remember being younger, the environment I grew up in, I thought when I'm going to grow up, I'm going to run away and never come back. But hearing John and Glen talk about how much they love the community, that's the kind of love I want to have for my own people, my own city. It's not about running away. God can guide us right here. Yeah, buildings can change, and new houses can be built up, but when people are transformed, that's the best thing in the world. 

Editor’s Note – This article has been edited for brevity, clarity and readability.