The Good News for Lansing
Apr 15, 2009 Print This Post
My friend JR is doing an interesting project on his blog called “The Good News.” Here’s a little overview:
In this blog series each of the contributors will be summarizing their understanding of the Good News in 300 to 500 words. Each author is writing their entry as if they were invited by their city newspaper to write an article on the Good News, thus you will find the name of the author’s city newspaper in each entry. This series will challenge us to grow in our ability to share the good news with a variety of people from different perspectives.
The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus are at the center of the Good News. I trust that this series of posts will help you to focus on the mutually enriching and mutually challenging nature of the Good News during this Easter Season – from Easter to Pentecost. As we focus together on the Good News, may we be encouraged to be living letters to the world, until Jesus fully re-shapes our planet and our Father’s will is fully done on earth as it is in heaven. Let the wind blow and the Spirit of Pentecost come freshly upon us.
JR has asked me to participate and I have to send him my entry next week. So, here’s my question for those of you who live in the Lansing area:
What are the most pressing needs in the Lansing area right now?
Especially in light of the state of the economy, I am wondering where the itch is. That may help form the direction I take my piece. I am also working on my next series and I think I may use some of the ideas there, too.
Tags: Lansing
April 15th, 2009 at 11:20 am
The big things that come to mind are the lack of jobs and, relatedly, the outmigration of college grads. These factors, among others, lead to a general resignation and a lack of hope here, like the state’s future is slowly but surely being destroyed.
April 15th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
1) We have to resist the idea of going back the way things were. Michigan shouldn’t look to manufacturing as the only hope.
2) At the risk of sounding like Albert Markovski from I 3> Huckabees: “Save the Open Spaces!”. There has to be some way to make it financially viable for developers (residential, commercial, whatever) to go into old run down areas (Detroit, for example) and RE-develop those areas. Tear down old buildings and build new ones, revamp them, do whatever. Instead of constantly spreading outward and abandoning areas to decay.
Detroit reminds me, in a couple of ways, of CS Lewis’ description of Hell in the Great Divorce.
- sean
April 16th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
Lansing is in a place of desperation and this causes people to act differently. I see Lansing at higher risk of crimes due to this situation. The community must pull together in these tough times and not turn against one another.
April 16th, 2009 at 6:28 pm
I have noticed that in these tough times people don’t see how much they need the Good News! They see what THEY have done to overcome and get by during this time instead of seeing what God has done for them through them.
It makes me sad to see people praying for help and when God comes through they don’t see His hand in it at all.
The need I see is to help those around us to see God’s hand in all the good, bad and ugly and how He has a plan no matter what.
April 16th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
My friend Jeremy is pursing a Ph.D. at Harvard in urban sociology, and his most recent work focuses on Detroit. Not exactly Lansing, but maybe he could provide some insights. You can contact him here: http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/soc/gs/Levine_Jeremy/.
April 17th, 2009 at 8:07 am
I think that there are alot of great small companies with tons of people that are working hard, and doin their part to stay in business, and keep the lights on, and food on the table at home. The problem around lansing is just like mentioned above that people see things as being so down, so negative and so depressing that they can easily overlook the fact that this cracked out community is awesome in some ways. CNBC.com said that Lansing/East lansing was one of the most affordable ‘metro areas’ to live in the country! Go Lansing! We have giant staples (which are much less prone to crumble under a recession than most) like this little thing called MSU, or how about the sparrow hospital network. People always need to learn, and people always get sick.
With GM being lansing’s left lung though, people see nothing other than the fact that the town is running and wheezing with a hole in it. If we can get away from our so called ‘dependency’ on GM suddenly I think that everyone that isn’t a former GM worker stuck scrambling for a new career will realize they are still working, and then we can start to put new developments over the old, and gradually reshape the city, bringing new revenue, and new hope to the people of the city, which will then hopefully build some momentum in a positive direction for once.
April 17th, 2009 at 9:15 am
Good stuff, everyone. Your thoughts are going to help with my post.
Keep ‘em coming.
April 17th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Being a GM Family, I hate it. They have cut our insurance so bad and everything. In a way I just wish they would go belly up so we can move on with our lives and stop waiting, waiting and waitng to see what happens. Lets get over this and move on already.