Corey Brooks
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First Person is produced in cooperation with the Far East Broadcasting Company, who rejoice in the stories of changed lives through the power of Jesus Christ. Learn more at febc.org. God is doing something great, doing something that we believe is a miracle. We're building something that's going to transform thousands and thousands of lives and hopefully make things different here on the south side of Chicago. So this is definitely a God thing. ♪

We are taking you on location for this edition of First Person right to the heart of Chicago's South Side for a conversation with a pastor who's committed to the gospel to bring about the spiritual and physical transformation of his community. I'm Wayne Shepherd, and you're about to meet Pastor Corey Brooks.

Thanks for listening today. Each week we bring you another life story of a person making a difference for the kingdom of God. Whether you are listening on radio or via podcast or smartphone app, I think you'll enjoy hearing how God is reaching deep into a Chicago neighborhood with his message of hope and love. We are found online at FirstPersonInterview.com where you can listen anytime to this or past programs. And also follow us on social media. Visit Facebook.com slash FirstPersonInterview.

Pastor Cory Brooks is the founder and senior pastor of New Beginnings Church of Chicago and the CEO of Project Hood, Communities Development Corporation. He's sometimes known as the rooftop pastor from spending hundreds of nights camped out on the roof of his church to build awareness for a new community center.

Well, we have a big story to tell in just a few minutes, but let's start with this, Corey. Where are we standing right now, this beautiful, unfinished building? Absolutely. So we're on 66 and King Drive, Chicago, Illinois, the south side. It's a block that was called O Block. We decided that this block that was called O Block, named after a young man named O.D. Perry, who was shot and killed. The gangs picked up the O in his name, started calling it O Block. We

We decided we're going to call it Opportunity Block. And on this block, we're transforming a neighborhood that's been called one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in all of Chicago. And we are here at the location where we are building a 90,000 square foot leadership and economic opportunity center. And we're sitting right in the midst of a miracle happening.

In Chicago. Yeah. Well, this building is partially finished. You've got a long ways to go. But you raised the money for this building in a pretty unique way. You're known as the rooftop pastor. Yeah. Tell me the story. So there was an old hotel here about 12 years ago. And?

And I wanted to bring attention to awareness to the violence in Chicago. That time I had done 25 funerals of young black boys who had been shot and killed and all their murders had went unsolved.

And I wanted to do something about it. And across the street from our church was this motel where there was sex trafficking, drugs, and the gangs were using it. And God led me to go up on top of that motel and not come down until I raised enough money to purchase it. Wait, wait, wait. You camped up there? I camped up there. November the 20th.

of 2011. It wasn't even summertime. No, definitely not. It was the winter in Chicago, November 20th, 2011. I came down 94 days later, February 24th of 2012 with enough money to purchase the motel. And that's what we did. We purchased it and tore it down. And then we started the process of creating a missions ministry called Project Hood underneath our church, our missions arm. And

with the idea of building this center. And fast forward,

10 years later, we didn't have the money to build the center. My son was like, hey, either you're going to build this center or the vision needs to change. And so I asked God, what should we do? And so I decided we were coming up on the 10th year anniversary. So we got eight train containers. We put them together, built another rooftop, and I went back up on the roof. And this time it took 343 days. Oh, my goodness. Yes. But after that, we had 20,000 new donors from all across America.

And we have raised about $20 million to get this project started. Amazing. And it's almost to the finish line, isn't it? It's almost to the finish line. The project is about $43 million. We have about $5 million more that we need to raise, that we're going to raise. And the facility is about 30% complete. We're now getting ready to start adding the steel fabrication, the steel beams and

The external structure. So it's already a fabulous building with just all of this concrete. But it's going to be even more spectacular once we start adding all the steel. Yeah. Well, we are right on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive in Chicago. Our listeners could probably hear the traffic around us here as we sit in this unfinished building. But the purpose of this is amazing. Talk about that. It's all under Project Hood, which is helping others...

Obtained Destiny, right? Did I get that right? Perfect. That was it. Helping others obtain destiny. And that's what this center is really about. It's about a place where lives can be transformed. So many times in our neighborhood, people are hopeless and desperate and sometimes want to change, but they don't have access to the things that would help them to take responsibility for their lives.

So we believe this center that we're building is all about helping individuals to transform. So inside the center is designed to help an individual who wants change in their life to get that change. So we have a.

trade school for those individuals who want to put down guns and pick up hammers. We're going to teach, we teach carpentry presently. We teach electrical, we're adding plumbing. We're going to be also adding automotive. We also are going to a welding facility inside the center. We also have a STEM lab where we're going to be, where our young people who are interested in STEM can learn STEM. We have a fabulous computer and technology center.

three restaurants. We have a bank. Presently, we have a bank that's located inside of our church lobby. That's pretty unique. Absolutely. Wintrust Bank. And we wanted to get started early, so we thought we would introduce it to the neighborhood before the center is complete. But when the center gets done, they're going to move from our church lobby and going to move over here to the center.

We have if you ask the kids in our neighborhood, what are the what's the thing you're most excited about? They'll tell you the swimming pool. So in this neighborhood where there have not been too many swimming pools, we have a great swimming pool being built. We have two gyms, a health and wellness facility, a trauma counseling facility, a state of the art theater facility.

a music studio, and a golf simulation room. You are changing this corner of Chicago. Absolutely. And it'll be really a blessing once we can get Moody to offer some classes here, right? There you go. All right. All right. We'll spread the word about that. Please do. Well, I want our listeners around the country to hear this about Chicago because they hear so many bad things about Chicago. And of course, this is a very tough place. Yes. You know that as well as anybody. Absolutely. It's a tough place.

A lot of lives have been lost in 2014. The Chicago Sun-Times called us the most dangerous neighborhood in all of Chicago. And, you know, our church, we took offense to that. We said, listen, we can't be in this neighborhood and allow it to be this bad. We have to do something. And so we've been working really hard and we've been adding programs and mentoring kids right now, even now this summer, which is the seventh time that we've offered it.

We have a free summer camp for over 250 kids who are in our summer camp who go to school here from 8 to 4 during the summer. I heard some noise being made as I came around the corner here today. A lot of noise and a lot of excitement. And we're really trying to transform this neighborhood. And we're seeing the change being done. And one of the things that I'm really grateful and thankful about is that

This is something that believers from all around the country can look at and say, hey, regardless of what's going on in Chicago,

the chaos, the destruction, the murder, the mayhem, there's a light shining in the midst of darkness. It can be done. It can be done. If it can be done in Chicago, it can be done anywhere, right? And that's what we believe. We believe God is giving us the opportunity to create a model for what can be done, especially in urban areas that are impacted with crime and violence and poverty. We're showing that, hey,

This is what you can do to transform a neighborhood. Yeah. Well, it's obvious that you are leading by example, but you're also leading by training, aren't you? Absolutely. You know, training is very important. A lot of people, a lot of times think that you can just do this work off the cuff, but you really can't. You really need to be trained and you really need to be biblically astute.

So I'm grateful that I grew up in a little town called Muncie, Indiana. It used to be called Middletown, USA, Muncie, Indiana. And I had the opportunity to go to Ball State University. And from Ball State University, when I graduated with a degree in political science, I always had this idea that I wanted to be a lawyer since I was a little kid. So I said, I'm going to go off to law school, even though I had accepted my calling to preach. I went off to law school at the University of Florida.

And I stayed there for a year and I tell people it was the worst year of my life. I did not want to be there outside of God's will. I was way outside of God's will. The first day in class, I knew I am outside of God's will. Please don't call my name to answer these questions. And so I called my pastor after a year and I was like, listen, I need to go to seminary. I know God wants me to go to seminary and be biblically trained. Where do you go?

And my pastor said, listen, pack your stuff, go to Dallas Theological. So I packed my stuff and I went to Dallas Theological Seminary and I stayed at that school until I was called to pastor a church over during a summer intern in Richmond, Indiana.

And I went and pastored that church because the pastor while I was doing the intern died, and they asked me to stay. And I'm so thankful that they let me practice on them at a very young age, at 22. And from there, I decided to go to Grace Theological, where a lot of the professors from Dallas were teaching. And I was able to commute and finish my education at Grace Theological Seminary. So you're the founding pastor of this church, New Beginnings. Yes, I'm the founding pastor of New Beginnings Church. Our church is

24 years old. We've been in this neighborhood for 18 years. It's a growing, thriving church, and God has really blessed us to have a real exciting congregation. I tell people, they ask, what type of church do you have? And we tell them we have a credible, contemporary ministry. And we try to be Bible-based and Jesus-focused. We'll continue to get to know Pastor Corey Brooks and hear his vision for his community in

Coming up on First Person, here's Ed Cannon on the vision for FEBC's weekly podcast. The primary purpose of Until All Have Heard, of course, is to share the experience that FEBC has because we have staff on the ground in so many oppressive places. But in addition to that, we're trying to speak to you in a way that only the kind of testimonies you'll hear from around the globe can do. Discover how the gospel is making a difference around the world.

Search for Until All Have Heard on your favorite podcast platform or hear it online at febc.org.

My guest is Pastor Corey Brooks of New Beginnings Church in Chicago and Project Hood. And we'll put information about all of this in our program notes so our listeners can look this up. Absolutely. And we're excited about sharing this story, Corey, because it's such a unique story. But you feel that God called you to this, didn't he? Oh, yes, absolutely. I believe without a shadow of a doubt that God placed me in this neighborhood, you know,

Being seminary trained, I probably could have gone to a lot of other places and planted churches in some suburban areas and probably done pretty well. But I know without a doubt that God placed me here.

So much so that people all the time are asking me, are you from Chicago? Are you from the South Side? Because I'm so entrenched and I feel so placed here that it feels like home. You've grown to love this place. I love this place. And I would not want to pastor or be anywhere else in the world other than the South Side of Chicago in Woodlawn, Oregon.

On O block. I belong here. Opportunity block. Opportunity block. God has placed me here and I really feel like God is doing something amazing and I get to be a part of it. Yeah.

Tell me some stories from the neighborhood of how God has worked through all of this and is working through all of this right now. Oh, I love to tell stories. So there's so many. I could tell you about Damarius, a young man who, Damario, excuse me, a young man who lives in Parkway Gardens, who that apartment complex is next to us. They have about 4,000 residents, mostly impoverished residents, a real...

high crime infested area and he was a part of our summer programs

He was a really smart kid or is a really smart kid. He eventually got accepted into University of Iowa from the University of Iowa. He ended up moving to California and he's now in a NASA program. And he is one of our shining lights that shows that you can take a kid in some very bad and difficult circumstances and infuse them with the gospel and they can become successful.

And so I love him and I love what he's doing. And there's other stories like Jonathan, who works on our church staff and a part of Project Hood, whose six-month-old daughter was shot and killed some eight years ago. And I just really felt led. I didn't know who he was. I didn't know him. But I felt led when I heard about it to go to the hospital and meet him and stay with his family and walk him through that whole tragic event.

Little did I know that he was not able to read. He was involved in gangs. He was involved in a drug background.

But I decided I knew God had placed me to be in his life. And now Jonathan's married. He's graduated with his GED. He works full time for our body's prevention team. And just a few months ago, he started his own landscaping business. So he's got a landscaping business on the side, great entrepreneur, and he's working for our church in

You can't ask for anything more. All too often, that's not the case with young people coming out of this community, but you're making a difference there. Absolutely. There are a lot of young people in our community who lose hope, even lose their lives. And it's very tragic. But I'm thankful that God placed us here and

And our church is here. The center is going to be here so that more young people don't have to lose their lives. And we'll be able to see more success stories like Jonathan and Demario every single day. And it does not become abnormal. We want it to become normal. Absolutely.

Well, as you know, there's always the conversation between evangelism and social action, and I'm sure you'd walk that tightrope as well, because this is a gospel ministry. You proclaim the word in your church, but at the same time, you're doing all of this. So you must have given a lot of thought to this. Absolutely. You know, coming from a background, a conservative theological background, you're challenged oftentimes with

the whole social justice type of thing and the whole evangelism and outreach type of thing. And one of the ways that, that I deal with it is that I say, listen, I just try to do what I believe Jesus would do. I believe that people were hungry. Jesus would feed them. I believe that people were sick. Jesus would visit them. I believe that people were addicted. He would try to get them off addiction. And so if you contemporize that,

We try to make sure that people are not involved in violence. We try to make sure that people get trained and equipped to do jobs. We try to make sure that fathers don't stay absent from their children. And we try to infuse the gospel around all of that so that it makes life better and it gives people hope. And it's a

It's a tight rope to walk sometimes. But at the end of the day, we just want people to have Jesus. Jesus makes the difference. I don't care what type of programs you do. If you don't give people Jesus, you're wasting your time. All right. I'm going to go back to the stories. These are so inspiring. I got to hear more about Change Lives because of what Christ and your ministry is doing here. Yes. Alfred Creamer. Alfred, they call him Big Al.

He was locked up and incarcerated with a group of about 30 other guys from the neighborhood. They all got arrested. They were all part of a gang called the Black Disciples. All of them were arrested. He was one of the leaders. One of his friends, one of his co-defendants got out of jail before him and became a member of our church. So when Al got out of church, he told him, hey, you need to go visit Pastor Brooks. He's changing the neighborhood.

Al came to visit the church. I challenged him on his life. I challenged him with Jesus. He accepted Christ. He then went on to get a job with us, working with our kids. He went through the carpentry program and got a construction job, a nice construction job. He then, after the construction job, got married.

After getting married, he bought a home. And now Alfred is one of the best volunteers for Project Hood and one of the best models that we have for Project Hood. Here's a man who came out of federal prison after doing 12 years.

And his life has been remarkably changed. His name's Alfred Creamer. That's fantastic. You're doing such a great job here, Corey. I mean, we can't even cross the street from your office into this new building without cars stopping to say hi to Pastor Brooks. Yeah, you know, and I appreciate it, you know.

Everybody wants to be affirmed and accepted and approved. And so it does feel good when you're in the neighborhood and people are recognizing your work and the work that you're doing is about Christ and about sharing the gospel. So I...

I would be lying if I say it doesn't feel fabulous to have people recognize that. And I realize it's not me, but it's the God working through me. So I want to be a good testimony for what a godly man can do in a bad neighborhood. We heard about you going to college and that law school experience, then seminary. But when did Christ come into your life, Corey? So at 12 years old, I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior at 12 years old at the New Hope Baptist Church in Muncie, Indiana.

I knew I was called to preach at 14, but I despised and did not like preachers at all. And I refused to be a preacher. You didn't preach at all at that age? No, I said I was not going to preach. How did you know you were called then? I knew the calling on my life. God placed it there. It was great.

I knew what it was. You were just running the other way. We would not go away. But I decided I was going to try to run away, kind of like Jonah. I don't want to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm done. And so at 14, even though I was a good athlete, I became really rebellious. And the streets were my home. But no matter how late I would come home on Sunday mornings or staying out all night at 15 and 16, my mom would

forced me to go to church. And I'm glad she did. And I tell people, I went to a church called Union Baptist Church at 19 years old. And there was this girl I wanted to date. And she said, the only way I could date her is if I go to church with her. So I was willing to do whatever it was going to take. I've heard that story before. So I went to church at 19 years old at Union Baptist Church. And I heard the gospel so clear and I yielded

to the call to preach. And from that day on, I've been preaching the gospel and I'm so glad she invited me to church. Do you ever sense that you are making a sacrifice in any way to do what you do, what God's called you to do? That's a great question. I think, yes, you do have to make a sacrifice. Sometimes it can be a very lonely sacrifice.

You know, I don't have a lot of friends and I'm OK with that, especially being a guy that grew up with a bunch of friends. So sometimes it can get a little lonely, but I'm glad that I have a really strong family that helps me through that.

The sacrifice of having to put in so much work. It takes a lot of it takes a lot of prayer, but it takes a lot of work. And I think you have to make you have to sacrifice a lot of time. And I think those two things, the sacrificing of time and the sacrificing of friendships, sometimes can be tough. But I.

I will say this, it's glorious hard work. Yeah. I'm going to ask you one last question, Corey, and that is what's fresh on your heart and mind from the scripture? What is the Lord teaching you? So our staff today, we talked about the standard of scripture and we talked about God's word and Timothy being the inspired word. And I think if I could leave any thought

Just asking people to just have an appreciation for

for the inspired word of God. I mean, when you think about the Bible being inspired by God, that is so powerful. Being inerrant in a day and a time where people want to just make the Bible just a regular book, a bestseller. It's more than a regular book. It's more than a bestseller. It is the inspired, inerrant word of God. And that

is powerful. It is. Pastor Corey Brooks, our guest for this edition of First Person. You have to admire his stand for the gospel to bring about hope and change for his Chicago neighborhood. If you'd like to learn more about Project Hood, helping others obtain destiny, we'll have links to it at FirstPersonInterview.com. It's an exciting story and it's making a huge difference in people's lives. Please share the link to this interview that you'll find when you click the red Listen Now button at FirstPersonInterview.com.

Well, the gospel changes lives all over the world here in the city of Chicago and in some of the remotest places on earth where there are people unreached with the good news. The Far East Broadcasting Company is committed to those corners of the earth where people need the Lord. To learn more about FEBC's broadcast ministry, please visit febc.org. And listen for the podcast until all have heard at that website or with your preferred podcast app. Until all have heard.

Now, with thanks to my friend and producer Joe Carlson, I'm Wayne Shepherd. Thanks for listening to First Person.