Bringing Hope to Ostracized People

At 6:45 a.m. on a chilly, mid-April morning, Pastor Scott Reese loads his 12-passenger van with canned goods and bottled water. He spends the next hour crisscrossing the south suburbs of Metro Chicago. In Chicago Heights, he passes boarded-up storefronts, homes and churches.

Stopping at one noisy, overcrowded overnight shelter after another, he picks up the “regulars.” These shelters, called PADS — Public Action to Deliver Shelter — close during the day, forcing their clientele to find other places to stay warm. So, Pastor Scott steps in.

At one stop, Larry and Tiere climb into the van. Larry — a former self-described “gangster,” boxer and ex-convict — was a village housing commissioner. He fell on hard times due to medical bills.

His friend, Tiere, suffers from respiratory problems and a heart condition, which frequently land her in the hospital. After four years of homelessness, she received subsidized housing across the hall from Larry. Of her monthly Social Security check, she spends $675 on rent and must live on the remaining $75.

In the van, she and Larry laugh and joke, grateful to avoid the long walk from their building.

For Larry, Tiere and others who have experienced homelessness, Pastor Scott provides compassionate consistency amid constant, exhausting instability. In 40 years of ministry in South Suburban Chicago’s inner cities, Pastor Scott has developed relationships by grieving and celebrating with those around him. He and his team — alongside church partners he’s recruited — now give hope and help to local homeless people.

An all-encompassing exhaustion

Born into a pastor’s family, Scott began serving in economically depressed neighborhoods at age 13. With his youth group, he ventured into Chicago’s most dangerous areas to share about Jesus. At 17, he organized an afternoon Bible club that later split into four clubs, where kids could play basketball, eat snacks and listen to gospel presentations. So many children came that he commandeered an abandoned building as a clubhouse.

“If the drug dealers use [abandoned buildings] to sell drugs and women, why couldn’t we use one for Jesus?” Scott says.

As he met these children’s families, he realized they needed Jesus, too. So, at 20, he started a church. Once, while walking children home to their apartment above a tavern, a man pulled a gun on him in the stairwell, saying, “If I ever see you again, I’ll kill you!” Months later, the tavern lost its liquor license, so the children’s parents encouraged Scott to rent the building for the church.

But living and working non-stop in the inner city took its toll. The murders of more than 100 friends due to gang and drug violence devastated him. By his mid-30s, Scott began having health problems, developing a heart condition by age 51 that still flares up. Mental and emotional exhaustion set in. Something had to change.

He took time for himself. He reached out to other Christians and churches, and they came alongside him. He knew intimately the challenges inner-city pastors and their congregations face — poverty, crime, drugs, despair and systemic racism. He started Christ Cares, a non-profit organization connecting urban and suburban churches, to help inner-city churches meet the needs around them. Together they sponsor food and clothing drives, help people get jobs and places to live, and mentor individuals to develop strong relationships with Jesus.

A different kind of community

After stopping at a run-down motel, the van picks up four more regulars at the police station’s warming room, where men and women escape the freezing nights. Finally, the group arrives at Overflow Ministry, a multicultural outreach of Flossmoor Korean United Methodist Church, one of many churches in Scott’s network.

Each church provides a monthly “day of rest,” a safe, warm environment including breakfast or lunch, Bible study and a washer and dryer. In the basement, Scott’s clients select free clothes from “Rebekah’s Closet” and visit around tables before breakfast.

Over eggs, bacon, sausage and fruit, Overflow’s Missions Coordinator John Harvey recalls his early experience with urban ministry. He’d heard about Scott and couldn’t wait to meet this pastor going into depressed areas.

According to John, most homeless individuals average three consecutive days without shelter. “Every day, week, month they’re over that [average], the more issues they have, the harder it is getting them housed,” John says. “If they have an income and can do the paperwork, they have a good shot at getting a house.”

After breakfast, the van drives to a small house next to First Church of Lansing, Illinois. Everyone files through the back door, up a flight of stairs to the kitchen, dining room and living room. Awaiting Scott’s Bible study and prayer time, they flop down on sofas and armchairs or at chairs around a table. Some go downstairs to do laundry.

Across the room, Margaret relates being unfairly evicted from last night’s shelter over a misunderstanding. But she’s grateful for Scott’s help through the years.

“I basically consider this my church even though I try to go to church, too,” she says. “I don’t feel like ‘oh, I have to dress a certain way.’ And it’s a day of rest, so if I’m tired, I can lie down and take a nap.”

On Thursdays, Scott’s team hosts 40 to 75 people, their largest gathering of people experiencing homelessness, in the Chicago Heights Public Library basement. After setting up chairs and tables, regulars take people’s contact information at the door, helping Scott learn more about them so he can invite them to other activities.

Church volunteers arrive with lunch, and once everyone has food, Sam Williams — a part-time Cru^® staff member who also works with Christ Cares — teaches about temptation and “what pulls folks off track spiritually.” The crowd watches, riveted as he shares his successes and failures and exhorts them not to make the same mistakes he made.

“He cried with us.”

As a young pastor, Scott first connected with the inner-city ministry of Cru in 1982, and later helped Sam, his long-time friend, get a job there. Sam returned the favor by joining Scott’s team. The two of them exemplify how this ministry in Chicago partners with more than 200 church partners, working together to help as many of the 80,000 people in Metro Chicago who are experiencing homelessness as possible.

After Sam’s Bible study, Scott and Sam meet new people and catch up with familiar friends. Tony, an inner-city pastor, talks with Joe, an off-duty police officer who’s served for 25 years. As youth, both had been part of Scott’s basketball ministry.

“We call Pastor Scott ‘Moses,’ because he brings everybody together from all different ethnicities and backgrounds,” Tony says. “He’s like a bridge-builder, so we love him.”

“Scott’s been a friend and mentor to me for 20 years, and I thank God he’s a part of my life,” Joe adds. “He’s been there for us. He never judges, he just shows [people] the love of Christ and a fresh encounter with Christ. He was accepted in the African-American community because he came; he cried with us; he was in the cold with us; he walked with us.”

Faces of Chicago Heights

Empowering the homeless to reach other people experiencing homelessness

On Fridays, Scott and Jay bring available regulars to the church where Scott formerly pastored, New Life Baptist. The neighborhood had experienced “white flight” — middle-class Caucasians fled neat ranch-style homes and manicured lawns as poorer minority groups moved south. During the last few decades, crime and violence have increased.

The church remains an anchor of stability and spiritual support in the midst of drug and gang activity that often catches innocent bystanders in the crossfire.

At New Life Baptist, Scott’s volunteers divide up. Some sort paperwork or play basketball with kids while others pack bags of food for those living under bridges and in the woods.

Douglas and Amber, a young couple experiencing homelessness, join in to help. Because Douglas is African-American, Amber’s family kicked her out when she was 16. His family rejected him because of Amber’s former drug problem. He dumpster-dived for cans and stole aluminum siding from empty houses to buy food. He’d get up at 3 a.m. to walk miles to beg for money. They stayed in abandoned houses, sharing an old mattress with another couple under separate blankets. Seven years ago, Amber, then 18, really needed an occasional day of rest and heard about a pastor who was providing them. After meeting Scott, she and Douglas became regulars who now help Scott reach others.

Margaret also attends every Friday because of Scott’s teaching and example. “I don’t have a lot to offer,” she says, “but I can offer something. I’ve been in this program a long time. I have a lot of resources and life experience.” She stays behind to pack food, while other volunteers go with Scott to deliver food and supplies to Brian, a military veteran living in the woods.

The vast needs across Chicago’s underserved communities are overwhelming. Scott relates to Jesus’ statement in Luke 10:2: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” He prays accordingly for “the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest” — in this case, into urban neighborhoods.

Scott recognizes that he has to pace himself, especially now that his wife, Lisa, has also developed health issues. “You’re surrounded by need, so you’ve got to maintain balance for enriching relationships and time to yourself,” he says. “You can’t just always give.”

But Scott keeps giving, gripped by Jesus’ love for these people. They aren’t just his mission field; they’ve become his friends.

Scott suggests that believers spend a week with Cru in the inner city to get hands-on experience. “If you have a heart of compassion,” he says, “God can use you in a powerful way, and there are opportunities everywhere.”