Face to Faith
S.J. Dahlman
6 Dec 2008
Johnson City (Tenn.) Press
It would be a stretch to say that a bedbug infestation was the best thing that could happen at the John Sevier Center, but the effort to get rid of the pests may have planted a community where one didn't exist before.
The center, which provides reduced-rent housing for about 140 people living on low incomes, was invaded by bedbugs about 18 months ago. Cleanliness or economics have little to do with the problem. Some of New York's finest hotels get them.
Last month every room in the John Sevier Center was fumigated, requiring all residents to pack their belongings, toss infested furniture and move out for a night. The task could have been a logistical and financial nightmare for the residents and the owners of the building, M & M Properties. The job went almost flawlessly, however, thanks to a little help from friends - a couple of them in particular.
Rich and Dori Gorman, who worked in urban ministry in their hometown of Savannah, Ga., moved here two years ago to attend Emmanuel School of Religion. As they asked around where they could serve the community, their minister pointed them to the John Sevier Center, where a lot of lonely people live. Rich and Dori started visiting there three times a week.
"We just wanted the people there to know someone cared about them, spending time with them, listening to their stories," Rich, 35, explained. "These are wonderful people who are incredibly gifted and talented, but they haven't had an opportunity to have that reaffirmed or to be in an environment to have their gifts flourish."
Soon they noticed other needs. Many residents lacked transportation, and so the Gormans started borrowing a church van every Friday to ferry people to Wal-Mart and doctors' offices. Then they realized many residents barely knew their neighbors, and so they started showing movies on Friday nights in a commons area, complete with popcorn.
From that has grown a five-night-a-week schedule of Bible studies, financial counseling and social events. To manage this expanding agenda, the Gormans, with three of their friends, formed a small ministry organization, the Friends at John Sevier.
The benefits, the Gormans insist, don't flow in one direction. It's not a ministry to residents as much as a ministry with residents, Rich said.
"My life has been changed more by the John Sevier Center than I've changed any individual," Dori, 26, said. "It's an opportunity to see what God can do in your life."
It didn't take long for the ministry to talk with M&M about the bedbug problem, but it took a few months of conversation to work out a plan. The owners committed to pay for the extermination (including a one-year follow-up), and the Friends at John Sevier put the word out to local churches, asking for help.
The response was breathtaking. During two weeks in November, more than 700 volunteers from 10 congregations worked floor by floor to help residents pack their belongings, remove their furniture, move to a hotel for an overnight stay paid by Good Samaritan Ministries, and then move back in. At least 10 local companies donated goods and services or sold them at cost. The Friends ministry has also collected more than $16,000 toward a goal of $22,000 to help residents replace their furniture.
"The best thing that's come out of this," Rich said, "is that there's more sense of community. Something profound has happened in the sense of residents taking care of one another. Every day, there's some small thing."
That sense of community, he thinks, is starting to reach beyond the doors of the center.
"This project hasn't just helped the John Sevier Center. It's helped downtown," he said. "It's in the way churches stepped up and got acquainted with downtown in a new way."
He hopes the acquaintance grows, with more churches, groups and individuals "adopting" residents of the center as new friends.
"A lot of residents felt like they were drowning," Rich said. "Then for the churches to come in and say, 'It's going to be OK. We'll walk with you. You're not going to drown' - that's been an amazing thing. I think God wants to care for the people there, to be the hands and feet of Christ at the John Sevier Center."
To find out more about getting involved with the John Sevier Center, phone (423) 926-3161 or e-mail FriendsAtJohnSevier@yahoo.com
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S.J. Dahlman is associate professor of communications at Milligan College. You can reach him at sjdahlman@milligan.edu
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