Justin & Leah

Meet Justin and Leah, the founders of New City Cleveland (NCC), a nonprofit organization in Cleveland’s Buckeye-Woodhill neighborhood and participants in LIFT, which we just launched this month around urban faith leaders!

Transformational healing is possible, and our city and its people need so much of it. Justin and Leah found this type of transformation in their church community in St. Louis for six years prior to moving back to Cleveland in 2017. They witnessed a church who cared deeply for relationships, bore each other's burdens, met the needs of the community and were very present - a church doing “church” differently - a reflection of the gospel.

They moved here with the goal of replicating this beautiful movement.

For Justin and Leah, they want to see multigenerational peace and healing in a neighborhood where most residents live in government housing, annual incomes are under $20k and there is a large African American population. Within these four blocks, they believe intentional and concentrated efforts to go deep with people will change its trajectory for the future.

“I want the community to know and see that believers are invested in their life and their neighborhood,” says Leah. Justin’s vision is the same, quoting a verse from Zechariah that says, “Old men and old women will come back to Jerusalem, sit on benches on the streets...move around safely with their canes—a good city to grow old in. And boys and girls will fill the public parks, laughing and playing—a good city to grow up in.”

“To lift someone up,” he adds, “you have to go low, and that’s a lot of hard work, but that's the work that heals". Connect with NCC here: https://www.newcitycle.org/connect.