We are so busy living life that only in looking back do we recall the
history we were part of. Riding across America on old highways like Route 66, we
see America and how it was before the Interstate System took full effect. We
should have seen it coming, but we were so busy going. We love cruising through
old downtowns, where life used to reside, where grocery stores, shoe stores, and
candy stores used to dot the store fronts. But these days, the storefronts
remain, but a whole new clientele does business there, we find head shops, drug
rehab, and many are turning to selling antiques or becoming second hand stores,
and the once highly desired, high rent store fronts now go for whatever they can
get. Short term leases, for high turnover is the new rule, some are
identifiable by their old signs or design, some hollow and used for storage.
But a piece of Americana left behind for the next business to try and make it.
Some of my earliest memories of shopping were going to the shopping
center. Ours was Blue Star Shopping Center, with lots of stores and parking,
the only reason to go to your car was to put the items purchased in the trunk,
then go back for more or lunch. Lunch at the counter at Kresge’s, before it
became K-Mart, meant hot dogs and fries, situated by the toy section, so when
your kid got rowdy, you sent him to go look at the toys. But soon shopping
malls were introduced, a great thing for places like Jersey, where lousy weather
is the norm. Imagine Christmas shopping without wearing your overcoat, and so
we did. Malls sprung up everywhere, and still dot the landscape, anchored by
big box stores. But they too are experiencing a downturn, for online shopping
led by Amazon and others negates going to the store at all. Many big name
retailers of my youth, Sears, K-Mart, Macy’s, Toys R Us, Radio Shack and others
are either in serious signs of decay, or gone altogether. We may be looking at
the next downtown facing extinction, and like the previous ones, what will they
become? Who needs over one million feet of building under one roof? The new
malls I see going in all have apartment complexes as part of the plan, but what
about the shopping malls we used to visit? Lots of square feet,
interested?
In Detroit and other cities, they are redeveloping these malls for jails,
rehab centers, and warehousing. Watching as both the occupancy and property
values go down. Where do we house the homeless, where do we house the
criminals? While some developers are busy with new projects, some are buying
these old properties for just the taxes owed on them, or even having them
forgiven, if only someone will renovate them. Make them new and usable again.
These days, your mall may become a distant memory to your kids, where they learn
to associate shopping more with UPS and FedEx. For isn’t those that deliver the
goods, the same as the place you shop?
I can remember in my pre-Christ Jersey days, driving down Front Street in
Plainfield, lined with huge churches of all denominations. Huge steeples,
beautiful grounds, and always on Sunday when out for our rides, filled with
people. But on a visit some years ago, so many are run down, some closed,
others in disrepair, as no one goes there anymore. Seems a generation walked
away from religion, and left the buildings behind. Now going the way of old
downtowns, but what use is there for an old church building? Designed for a
single purpose, the land being worth more than the building, the stain glass its
main asset. Places where families used to meet, now gone. Like the malls of
today, doomed to replacement, but by whom and for what?
Before my friend Fr. Al passed away, he and another man had a vision to use
these old church properties. Bought for pennies on the dollar, they would open
them up to different denominations each night. Catholics Monday, Jews Tuesday,
Baptists Wednesday, and people began to come out and go to church again. Once a
place where fellowship, parties, meals, and celebrations were held, now they
were being used again. Breathing new life into communities, and into the people
who lived in them. Proving that we are the church, not the building, and when
Jesus is the main thing, change happens.
But if the church is to stand, it must be built on a strong foundation, and
if not on Jesus Christ, it will be be doomed to fail. Businesses and
communities fail because they lost their purpose, lose their direction, and soon
are wandering then gone. But we as the church need to ask ourselves, “where is
Jesus in our lives?” “How does the world see us as Christians, and what is our
purpose?” We talk of our faith, but do we talk of our obedience to the spirit?
Do we build without a plan, based on surveys, or do we trust God? Man of
faith, where is your obedience? If you were a store selling Jesus, why would I
shop with you? Yet many money changers have changed us and the church. But it
always comes down to the individual, to who we are in the person of Jesus
Christ. He is not a franchise we purchase, not a façade we put out on Sundays.
There must be an evidence in us of him, no matter the situation. His light is
to shine through us, so when they see your good works they see him. That Jesus
is who he says he is, not just a saying on a sign. When we attain the person of
Jesus in our lives, it will show, and the neighbor hood around us may decay, but
we will prosper. Shopping habits change, places to shop may change, Jesus never
does. What you signed up for is who you get, at home, at work, and at church.
If not the same in all places, maybe it is you that needs to change. Or you too
could soon be an old building for sale to the highest bidder, losing your way
and purpose.
Jesus makes all things new again. Failing at life, he will deliver you.
Losing in relationships, he will heal them. Lacking faith, he will provide.
Needing a boost of obedience, he is there. Let him show you how he is adequate
in all things, not just at church. Not just on Sunday. Not just when you have
lost all hope. Let him fill the vacancy in your heart today, watch as business
booms, ie your relationship with him, and as social trends change, he doesn’t.
And you can meet them. You were bought for a price, not to be sold for pennies
on the dollar. Wal-mart may be the saving place, only Jesus saves. And at
today’s prices, that’s still a miracle...
love with compassion,
Mike
matthew25biker.blogspot.com