Brew City isn't all beer and cheese...

ATTN: Long Post. If you have something to do/ somewhere to be, you have been forewarned.

This past week was MSOE's spring break. Yeah, yeah... it's really late for spring break. I know. You don't have to tell me. The InterVarsity chapter at my school had the privilege of having our own Milwaukee Urban Plunge (MUP for short)! This week is to train and inform the college population of the injustices urban populations go through. Another thing that this trip did was to empower college students to do something about these issues. This week (that wasn't really a week I guess) lasted from Tuesday till Sunday. The theme for the week was "Who is my neighbor?" The reasoning for this to be the theme was that the college campus sets up walls around itself so that it doesn't have to experience the outside world. Honestly, if I didn't want to, I could go a month without hearing about anything outside of the MSOE world. This trip forced us to get a (hypothetical) ladder and look over those walls into the parts of Milwaukee that are deemed undesirable by society. The week looked a little something like this:

In the morning we would have a Bible study going over various passages dealing with the "Who is my neighbor" theme of the trip. The passages included James 2, John 4, Acts 18:8-25, and Ruth 1-2. The study made clear that our "neighbors" are anyone that we come in contact with. When Jesus said in Mark 12:31 that we should "love our neighbors as ourselves" he wasn't just talking about our physical neighbors. We also discussed injustices that dealt with neighbors (everyone) and how we (middle upper class white folk) tend to shy away from looking at those issues (especially when those people don't look like us, come from the same background, or believe the same things as us). We weren't just shown the wrong things to do but the good things as well.

The next part of our day we went to a ministry on the north side of Milwaukee called Mother Scott's Christian Youth Center. This place is blessed upon blessed by God. Mother Scott is considered by many as the "grandmother of Milwaukee". She has been serving in Milwaukee since 1974. This ministry provides hot meals to the homeless and poverty stricken, has a food pantry, clothing donations, addiction counseling, a 24 hour prayer hotline, as well as summer programs and tutoring for children. They also have a computer lab that they are currently working on getting internet in. This computer lab does wonders for the homeless community. When someone doesn't have access to a computer it's considerably more difficult to look for jobs, make a resume, and read the news. Mother Scott's also mostly hires people that are living in poverty/ need. In the time serving there I spoke to at least 3 people that said they just started working at Mother Scott's and got hooked up with them through a temp agency. Seeing Mother Scott interact with the people that were in her building allowed me to see why she was widely known as the "grandmother of Milwaukee". She has such authority, people respect her, she is intimidating but has unfailing love for everyone, and she strives after God and encourages others to as well.


In the evening of the days during MUP we experienced the city more. The activities that we did included watching a documentary about the civil rights movement in Milwaukee and the racism still prevalent in the city (Milwaukee is the most segregated city in America). This opened up my eyes to the complexity and abstractness of segregation and how everyone contributes to it.

Another evening activity was going to a Hispanic church on the south side of Milwaukee called Desatar (day-say-tar: means undo or untie) for their evening service. The sermon this night was about being a good steward of what God has blessed you with. This was extremely interesting because just that morning our planned quiet times was on Revelation 18 and the temptation of materialism. The sermon at Desatar spoke on God wanting to bless His people financially and it's our job to do good with what we have. (Those of you that are familiar with the prosperity gospel, this is not that.) Our quiet times, on the other hand, was talking on the temptation of materialism and wanting our stuff too much. The reason that these two things are such an interesting contrast is that, on the surface level, these are two opposite teachings. However, if we go too far in either direction (not wanting money because it is "evil" and wanting money too much), is not sound theology. Yes, God does want to bless us with enough money to survive and live in this world. Yes, God wants your full and undivided attention, not distracted by something as trivial as money. There is a happy medium between the two. Another thing that I learned from the contrast between the two was the cultural differences and the fact that with different cultures comes different struggles while following.

Thursday night we went to a food kitchen in the downtown of Milwaukee called St. Ben's. This was probably the most thought provoking and best experience that happened all week. At St. Ben's all we did was get food and sit down to talk to another person there that we didn't previously know (preferably a homeless/ poverty stricken person). I talked to a man named John (he introduced himself to me as Giovanni). While I ate with him the conversation went from Illinois to Abraham Lincoln to Bill Clinton to Monica Lewinsky to legalizing weed to other laws in America that should be passed. After eating, John left. I felt the urge to go pray for Him. So I got up and asked if I could pray for him, he agreed and asked if we could go outside. We talked for another 20 minutes outside about Christianity, family, and injuries in our lives. While talking to this man that may or may not be homeless, I was thinking to myself "Why am I so afraid of people like this?" Here he is, pouring his heart out to me and on the verge of tears. He's a person. I'm a person. There's no more reason for me to be afraid of him than there is the professor that is teaching my Macroeconomics class. As I'm writing this, I'm understanding that this is what the theme of the week is all about. If we're all living in the same city, under the same government, surviving through the same weather, and created by the same God, why can't we just love each other like it? Why do we fear people that are different than us? Why do people feel that they can't change? Why does our society marginalize the people that don't have and seclude the people that have a lot? What would love do to our society? What would it look like to have everyone love everyone? Maybe the Beatles were right...