Who are the trophies of grace in your mind? Athletes? Actors? Government leaders? I don’t want to lessen the miracle of salvation God works in the lives of these high-profile figures. But do you have a pecking order? Do you start with the influencers and pop culture icons, move on to the college students, remember the poorest of the poor? And then somewhere down the line think of . . . everyone else? I live with “everyone else.” Some of them don’t even use the internet!

When people ask me where I live, I tell them Minneapolis, Minneapolis. It’s not really true. I live in Andover. To get to Minneapolis, you’ll drive for 35 minutes without traffic.

I’ve not seen too many books on missions, church planting, and ministry strategy that addresses a city like mine. It’s not a small town that people romanticize as a “sacrifice” to serve. Neither is it an influential urban center. It’s a sprawl. There is no racial diversity. I have lived here eight years, and I recently realized that I have seen probably a dozen people who have a different skin color than I do. I have seen one Muslim and no Hindus. There is no one I know of from Africa or Asia.

My city is Scandanavian with a little bit of German. I thought about getting involved in some refugee ministry, but the nearest I found is 45 minutes away. When I interviewed at the Christian school that brought me here, the first groups of kids I met all had blonde hair and a last name of Larson, Olson, or Carlson. I am not exaggerating. There is no university here; there is a community college 15 minutes away. But you won’t find any college students in the churches. I don’t see many single young professionals on Sunday morning. I live in a city of families. And churches. Within three miles of my house there are at least a dozen.

Moving here required an adjustment. I grew up near Washington, D.C. My neighbor was a congressman. My dad was a high-ranking military officer. The high school I attended was diverse racially and economically. After I became a Christian I found that the evangelical churches included members that were making major decisions for our country. But Andover is no such place.

Does this sound like a place a strategic ministry should plant a church? Probably not, which might explain why there is no church within 25 minutes that teaches expositional messages from Scripture with an overall Reformed perspective.

The “probably not” is what scares me. My neighbors are not poor enough to attract support from mercy ministries. I can’t hand them a book, because they don’t read and have no interest in doing so. My neighbors work at Walmart. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a picture of them on the internet. Every house on my street has a truck in the driveway. Almost everyone here does manual labor and depends on the upper middle class and the wealthy to landscape their property and remodel their homes.

Meanwhile my friends and I read books on shaping culture and influencing future leaders. Most of the Reformed ministry with which I’m familiar aims for fellow thinkers. We love reaching young, educated, globally minded, influential people who live in diverse cities. So who will reach the lower ends of the middle class?

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