High Hopes

Behind him is the Los Angeles skyline, before him the Hollywood Hills with its iconic sign, and beneath him 15 stories of opportunity set among 125 city blocks of despair. Matthew Barnett stands atop the old Queen of Angels Hospital building, now called the Dream Center, home to 214 outreach ministries—and counting. For this neighborhood, it’s a city set on a hill, a sign of hope—and help.

Matthew Barnett says he loves this neighborhood, but it took a while. At age 20, the son of Phoenix pastor Tommy Barnett was called to pastor Bethel Temple, one of the last English-speaking Assemblies of God congregations in inner city L.A. From this fragment, the first church founded out of the Azusa Street Revival of 1906, Barnett had high hopes of a bustling megachurch like his dad’s. Soon, however, even the remnant had left. He was alone.

Click here to see a related article.

That’s when he began exploring the community. This suburban neophyte fell in love with his drug-and gang-infested neighborhood. He began dreaming up ways to help those who had no choice but to call this blight home. And the church began to grow.

Within three years Barnett was looking for a larger facility when he stumbled upon the abandoned hospital. With relentless fundraising and divine intervention, the father-son team acquired the property for one-fourth the original asking price, and the Dream Center was born.

It’s a really big dream.

Today the center offers a fully staffed mobile medical unit, job skills and computer training programs, sidewalk and bus ministries for at-risk kids in government housing, after-school tutoring and recreation, residential recovery and discipleship programs for ex-drug addicts, housing and schooling for teens from troubled families, and outreach to runaways and the homeless.

There’s an artistic element here too, with acting classes, a recording studio, and TV production facilities. In some ways, this place has the vibe of an ambitious suburban mega-church. But it’s in an old hospital in inner city L.A., and half the people here were hooked on something a short while back. Now they’re hooked on Jesus, big dreams, and saving this city. Apparently it’s working. The local police precinct gives much credit for a measurable drop in crime to the Dream Center’s efforts.

Down the hill and just around the bend from Dodger Stadium is the newest piece in this ministry matrix—the famed Angelus Temple. Seeing the impact of the Dream Center, leaders of the Foursquare Gospel denomination asked Matthew to rescue the dying church, once packed-out by founder Aimee Semple McPherson but recently a near-empty shell. Now it’s thriving again, another impossible dream come true.

Barnett, now 30, will quickly tell you the innovation here is not his alone. People catch the dream and start dreaming, and ministries multiply. But how?

This is not the dream you first dreamed, is it?

At first I had the dream of preaching like my dad to tens of thousands of people. I had success manuals on my shelves and sayings on my walls. But when I came to Bethel Temple, the church shrank from 18 down to virtually nothing. I just wept. And God said, “I want you to visit Echo Park.”

There, within blocks of the church, God showed me criminals and youth gang members up against police cars and all the need in this place. God spoke to my heart: “I want you never again to think about the word success. I want you to die to your dream of being a success and live to the dream of being a blessing. I want you to fall in love with the city and serving people, and let me build the church.”

How did you get your tiny congregation to love their threadbare neighborhood?

One block at a time. If we’d said, “We’re going to take this city for God,” someone could say, “No, you’re not. There are 18 million people here.” That’s unrealistic and discouraging. So we started with a realistic goal—a 40-block radius. We believed that if we could make a difference in that area, it might not be the whole city, but the city would take notice.

The plan was to have church members adopt a block and serve as pastor of that block. They’d visit the people every Saturday morning, get to know them, find out their needs.

For the first nine weeks, we didn’t preach to anybody. We just asked, “How can we serve you? Do you need your house painted? Fix a washing machine?” Then we asked if we could pray for them.

Eventually, our block pastors would share “the Romans Road,” the plan of salvation. We taught them to share four Scriptures and their own testimony.

It’s the old Baptist witnessing formula, but it works.

This sounds like old-style parish ministry. Tell us about the block you adopted.

My first block was two blocks north of here. I had 52 people on my block. Of the 52, 35 of them now come to the church. When I began visiting, I could complete the block in about 45 minutes. Now, it could take three hours. Everybody wants to sit down and talk, tell me what’s going on with the family. I’ve performed funerals and all kinds of ministry for them.

They know we’re real, just by our serving them and being there weekly, loving them, not just preaching.

Now we have adopted about 125 blocks. Crime is down. The area around the church is coming back.

And now we’re encouraging people who commute in to worship here to adopt blocks in their own communities.

So the adopt-a-block approach turned the church on to ministry?

I’d say 40 ministries or more came out of adopt-a-block. Our block ministers saw the needs and asked, “People on the block need clothes. Can we start a clothing store?” Or “Can I start a food ministry?”

If people can set realistic goals and complete them, then they will take on bigger challenges. They’ll have a track record and credit with the people, and the church will support them.

Now, when I say we’re going to provide food for 50,000 people per week next year, the congregation believes it, because we have been consistent in meeting our goals. And it creates an appetite for bigger goals later.

What is your role as pastor in the creation of new ministries?

In the beginning, I was the chief dreamer, because nobody really understood where we wanted to go. Now that everyone understands, it’s changed; I’m the provoker of dreams. All the great ideas coming forth—the skateboard park, the recording studio, the rehabilitation programs for drug addicts and for teens—they’re coming from our people. I spur people to be creative.

When I hear the medical team talk about the hundreds who have no medical care except what the Dream Center mobile unit provides, or about the churches that partner with us to distribute food to 30,000 people each week, or I hear the testimonies of the “disciples” whose lives have been rescued from drugs, I think, Oh, man, this thing has grown so far beyond me.

At first, I was driving everything and dreaming for the people. Now it has taken on a life of its own.

Any ventures suggested that are outside the bounds of your ministry?

In our church we believe we can meet every need in our community—if we’re patient and willing to pay the price. Some typical church ministries aren’t really necessary in this immediate area, but if it’s needed here, we’ll eventually get to it—reaching transvestites or runaway kids, or connecting businessmen in Beverly Hills with a cause and purpose for their life.

If there’s a need, we’ll eventually get to it.

When a church has a history of innovation, does that now become the norm?

People expect it to happen, and I think they should. I don’t want to reach a place where the church thinks it’s done creating. When I begin to feel like we’re getting stagnant, that’s when I know it’s time to create something new. The greatest way to rally a church is to start a new ministry.

You have a real sense of optimism. In fact, that’s characteristic of most everybody we’ve met here.

There’s a real sense here that whatever ministry we want to do, we can do it. When we see Echo Park all torn up, we say, “Let’s beautify this community,” and we do.

We have failed lots of times at starting new ministries—the timing wasn’t right or the right leaders weren’t in place—but we don’t get bogged down by that. We just scrap it, learn something, and start over.

It’s been our observation that many people in inner city ministry develop a low-grade anger.

Right.

They become fueled by their anger at injustice. It sounds as though you are fueled by something different.

I am. I believe people care. I tell our congregation, “People care about you. People in Beverly Hills care; people in Malibu care.” We don’t allow our people to take on a victim mentality. That’s defeating.

True, there are injustices in the world; we face the brutal facts, we sympathize with the pain, we talk about poverty, sin, and generational curses. But we have to provide optimism, while painting the truest picture of reality.

The body of Christ is still the greatest force for change in the world. I see it every day. Where there’s a problem, I say we’re going to change it.

Without becoming hard.

We have to be soft; we can’t be hard.

Some of the best people for reaching out to gang members are not people who were once gang members. That’s a misconception.

The best people are the soft ones, the 70-year-old grandmother from Oklahoma who spends a week at the Dream Center on a mission trip, who’s never been to the inner city but walks up to them and just talks to them about Jesus.

I’m a suburban church kid from Phoenix who never got in fights—but sometimes a person who’s totally different is what they need to be brought out of their situation, something different from the hardness they’ve seen and experienced.

I remember the first night I was in L.A. leading a service at Bethel Temple, someone told us that a kid who lived across the street had been killed in a gang fight. I took up a collection and went over there. The house was full of gang members. I slipped in and spoke to the boy’s grandmother. I handed her the money and told her we would be praying for her, and I went to the door to leave quickly.

One of the guys in the gang, a big guy, put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Come back here, and pray now.” What choice did I have? Standing there in the middle of them, I prayed for the grandmother, and soon I was praying for these men to quit fighting and leave the gang and surrender their lives to Christ. I didn’t know any better.

People who don’t know any better can make good witnesses.

Being a pastor’s kid seems to be a plus for you. Your father is obviously a big influence on your ministry—he is in leadership at the Dream Center while continuing his pastorate in Phoenix. Any other strong influences?

I learn from all kinds of people. A Pentecostal kid who goes to a Baptist school picks up a lot. I learned from Jack Hyles, for example.

The late fundamental Baptist Jack Hyles?

Oh, yeah. He had no use for Pentecostals, so I’ve learned to chew the meat and spit out the bones, so to speak. But he was a tremendous soul winner, and he had great influence in the greater Chicago area. My dad attended his conference and learned bus ministry from him—bus captains and all of that. We adapted that. Today we have 17 buses that bring inner-city kids to our children’s church services on Sunday, but we also take the gospel to kids every week through our sidewalk Sunday school ministry.

What about Jim Bakker? He came to the Dream Center after serving time for his PTL fraud conviction.

My perception of him was totally different from what most people thought. He wasn’t greedy or money hungry. He’s loving and open to people, probably a little bit gullible at times, but Jim is the most generous man I’ve ever met.

He just showed up here one night. He was in town to appear on the Larry King show, and he came to a service. He stayed over the next day and asked if he could go on the street outreach. He went to rescue runaways on Hollywood Boulevard. The next day he went out on the food truck. And one day turned into two years. He started life over here—he didn’t even go home to pack—and it became one of the greatest moments of his life.

I see two lessons from his life: (1) his ministry was an example of what can happen when you surround yourself with people who don’t have the same heart you do. His heart was in the right place, but he wasn’t careful about who he opened himself up to.

And (2), don’t get caught up in tangents. Jim was creative and innovative—

But it turned into theme parks and water slides.

Yes. A lot of pastors are trying to be innovative in ways that aren’t true to who they are. You have to know your city and its needs. And watch out for the tangents. Stick to what’s needed, and don’t get caught up in things that aren’t.

Your predecessor at the Angelus Temple had quite a reputation for innovation. What about Aimee Semple McPherson?

Any comparison to her ministry I would consider a great compliment. I light up like a Christmas tree when I hear that. Not because of the situations involving her private life—we can’t ignore that—but because she took the gospel to places it doesn’t normally go. She made the church an engine of social change as well as spiritual change. During the Great Depression, she fed 30,000 people a week, the same number we’re feeding today.

And as dramatic as she was, I think she was, in most ways, being herself.

“Herself” was pretty flamboyant.

Maybe we’re not as flamboyant. Aimee was a fiery preacher, but she used a lot of common, real-life illustrations. I think in preaching, like her, I’m being “who I am.” A lot of guys try hard to relate to the audience. They change their style to match the congregation. I can’t worry about whether I’ll offend the unsaved. I believe in just opening up and being yourself.

You have brought significant change to two historic congregations. How do you innovate when surrounded with tradition?

There were about 25 or 30 people here at Angelus Temple when I first preached here. Now we see hundreds who once attended coming back, some who remember Aimee Semple McPherson, and many who were here during the ministry of her son, Dr. Rolf McPherson.

One challenge is people wanting to go back to an earlier time, rather than live in the moment God has given us now. I tell them the way to honor the past is to recreate it by having success in the future. I say, “We’re not being fair to future generations if we don’t allow them to see what you saw.”

The past serves as inspiration for fresh innovation. I tell the stories of the past, and every time I say, “That’s only to tell you that it can be done again.”