How Poor Are We?

True or false: Rochester is the 5th poorest city in the country?

True. Did you know that? Do you know that Rochester is the 2nd poorest city among cities of comparable size?

This chart and information comes from an article published by the Rochester Area Community Foundation Inc. in December 2013. You can read the whole article here.

How do you define poverty? Northridge Serves partners with organizations that hold tightly to the gospel while meeting physical needs in dignifying ways –that is to say, we partner with organizations who understand both the spiritual and physical poverty of those in our city. We are all spiritually poor without Christ, but sometimes in order to realize that poverty and that there’s salvation, our physical poverty (“the state or condition where individuals or families lack the financial resources to meet basic needs”) needs to be addressed as well. You can picture it this way: a hungry person’s stomach can growl so loud he can’t even hear you share about Jesus. We can’t ignore either need, and our partnering organizations work to meet both.

Although we can’t ignore either, we know that not everyone knows the physical poverty state of our city. So we’re embarking on a mini-blog “poverty series” to share with you how poor we are, and what you can do about it through our partnering organizations. Stay tuned.