According to the US Census Bureau, almost 30 percent of the people living within five miles of our church do not have the ability to paint their own home. If population projections are correct, that number will grow to nearly 35 percent by 2011. These folks are not impoverished or disabled, yet they do not have the ability to drive a nail to hang a picture, cut down a tree in their yard, or have a pet in the house. I am one of them! And have been all my life. I rent! Ronda and I have never owned a home. We are not opposed to home ownership; we just have never bought a house. For the nearly 30 years we’ve been married, we have rented or lived in a church-owned parsonage. It’s just always worked for us.
Now I know you might say, “Well, Pastor, you’re just throwing good money after bad. Don’t you realize that had you bought a home when you got married, you could soon be burning the mortgage! Besides, you can’t do what you want. You have no way to build up equity. You are simply helping someone else get rich!”
I know all that to be true, and maybe I’m stuck in the rent mode because my parents rented all their lives.
Yet there is some other statistics about the people who live within a five mile radius of our church that you need to know. Everyone who lives within five miles of our church is a renter! In fact, everyone who lives in Bossier City, and Shreveport, yea in Louisiana, the United States and the whole world:
EVERYONE IS A RENTER!