Katrina Relief Urban Project Part II

Intervarsity is partnering with a local church in St. Bernard's Parish that housed us and coordinated all of our work. Adullam Christian Fellowship is a storefront church founded in 1996 by Pastor Randy Millet and his wife Jill. It is definitely not the kind of church I would usually want to attend. But it was definitely the kind of church I needed to attend last week. Again, I said the word "powerful" keeps coming to mind and that is what I see at Adullam - a power-filled ministry.

If you have ever seen the movie The Apostle with Robert Duvall then you might have a clue as to the kind of preacher and pastor Pastor Randy is. I can't really say that Pastor Randy had a sermon prepared the Sunday we attended his church. But I can say that he had a word from God. That is to say, he preached.

He preached life into what is otherwise a dead community. St. Bernard's was washed completely away by Katrina and Adullam Christian Fellowship lost 9 out of 10 of its membership to displacement after the storm. (In fact, Pastor Randy's mother-in-law was one of the ones who lost their lives in one of those nursing homes.) But I gotta say that Pastor Randy is literally preaching St. Bernard's back into existence. What were once dead bones are now alive again and that little church is becoming an incubator for the Gospel, not only in the New Orleans, but across the world. Mark it down.

So what did I learn? Pastor Randy runs with folks like Benny Hinn and a bunch of other church movers like that. Not the kind of guy I would have chosen to bring a bunch of skeptical college students out to see. I was thinking, "O man, I'm gonna have to do a lot of explaining." But man, there was something very very real about what was going on in worship and I looked up and about half the students who came with us were dancing in the aisles by the end of the service. And those who weren't dancing basically said, "Hey, it wasn't me, but I really appreciated being a part of it all."

St. Bernard's Parish ain't gonna come back to life by boring exegesis. But it is gonna come back - it is coming back - by the proclamation of a Jesus who is alive and wants dead bones to dance.