Every Square Inch in Roosevelt Park

The “every square inch” theology of Reformed theologian Abraham Kuyper is evident these days throughout the Roosevelt Park neighborhood of Grand Rapids, Mich., observes Reggie Smith, diversity leader for the Christian Reformed Church in North America.

Located near downtown Grand Rapids, this largely Hispanic neighborhood has been Smith’s home, the community where he served as a church pastor, and the area in which he has been a community development leader for years.

Today, especially after the announcement of multimillion-dollar developments in the community, he considers his neighborhood a prime example of how faith in God can work. 

What has happened in this community, Smith said, shows how God can move out from the walls of a church and spread in redemptive and enduring ways through the streets, parks, businesses, homes, and schools – and, with the breath and push of the Holy Spirit, uplift the lives of the people who live and work there.

This is where the theology of Kuyper comes in, Smith said. Kuyper, a theologian who served as prime minister of the Netherlands from 1901-1905, once proclaimed: “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!”

For more than 30 years, Smith has worked and lived with that declaration in mind. And this notably Reformed approach is taking on a distinctly public form.

A recent story in Crain's Grand Rapids Business reported that “four major projects are in the works on the neighborhood's western border and within the neighborhood boundaries.” Taken together, the projects will involve more than $160 million in investment in a community that is sometimes referred to as “the Ellis Island of Grand Rapids” because of its mix of immigrants.

“Many of us have worked for years to see the rebirth of this neighborhood,” said Smith. “These new developments are an example of what grassroots work and collaboration, along with faith in the future, can accomplish.” 

The new projects include the following:

• a mixed-use project involving the renovation of a long-vacant property that once housed a furniture plant, a parachute maker, and an automotive seat supplier 
• the new headquarters for the West Michigan Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
• a project to refurbish a vacant building for a family-owned grocery chain's fourth store and corporate offices 
• the multimillion-dollar renovation of a vacant church building, where the Hispanic Center of Western Michigan plans to expand programming for the local Latino community

Smith traces his part in the transformation of Roosevelt Park – from being a place plagued by poverty, gangs, drugs, struggling businesses, and dilapidated housing – to the work he helped to move forward while he served as a pastor at the now-closed Roosevelt Park CRC.

“From the start, as a pastor, I believed a church needs to be intentionally grounded in its community. It should not be reclusive but involved,” said Smith, whose current work for the CRC is to promote the inclusion of people of all races and backgrounds into the fabric of the denomination.

After completing his education at Calvin Theological Seminary in the early 1990s, the Chicago native and his family put down roots in the Roosevelt Park neighborhood, which, after being home to many Dutch immigrants in the mid-20th century, had started to become a destination for immigrants from Mexico and Latin America to live. Today many families from West Africa and elsewhere are moving into the neighborhood as well.

After being called to serve Roosevelt Park CRC, said Smith, he was able to gather like-minded folks who were committed to seeking the peace and stability God asks people to embrace in the places where they live.

Joining with others in the area, said Smith, they began taking on the problems of gang wars. In one case, after a deadly shooting at a local bar, they fought to have the city shut the business down. They succeeded, and a beauty parlor moved into the building.

They also worked to bring in outside groups to refurbish aging housing, and they lobbied the city for stronger regulations to upgrade housing standards. They helped open a library and then an arts academy; they played an important role in building larger and more accessible schools for area children; and through prayer and various efforts they sought to bring whites, Blacks, and Latinos together for community events.

In addition, the church began Roosevelt Park Ministries, a separate entity from the church and housed in an old bank building, that offered language classes, tutoring for students, activities for youth, and income-tax assistance for residents. The ministry is still active.

“I saw tremendous changes in the Roosevelt Park area as people joined together to address the challenges” that are common to many evolving urban areas, said Smith, who has been president of the Roosevelt Park Neighborhood Association for nearly 30 years.

At one point, Smith said, he also served on the Grand Rapids Planning Commission, where the nuts and bolts of what gets built, renovated, torn down, or envisioned in the city occurs. For him, it gave an insider’s view of how the gears of municipal change and innovation turn – often slowly but, if you can stick with it, he said, you can help to make good things happen in your community, such as building sidewalks where they are needed.

Smith traces his faith-filled approach to ministry to joining Lawndale CRC on Chicago’s west side when he was a youth. In that church, he said, he saw people of different races worship together and join to create a school for youth in the neighborhood.

He carried a similar vision to Roosevelt Park CRC and then into the neighborhood. And as he sees this part of Grand Rapids thrive, Smith said, he is hopeful that its richness can grow and become even more apparent in the CRC denomination.

But his belief in and commitment to change goes beyond the denomination. He is certain, he said, that God wants the world to be more blessedly diverse.

“The story we see developing in Roosevelt Park can happen elsewhere,” Smith said. “This is not just something that happens inside a church. It’s what happens outside a church and is an example of what our faith can help to do.”

God is active and at work everywhere – and what we need to do, said Smith, is to join God and get busy doing divine work in a secular world.

“God is concerned about everything – politics, economics, art, business, our neighborhoods,” said Smith. “God is here and active and wants us to join in and find ways to join in his creative activities together.”