The Amtrak train from Pittsburgh ends in the middle of Manhattan (the one in New York). Then you rise one level from your train into the center of a beehive. Trains run in every direction; people walk and run in every direction. You rise further to a doorway that opens to the exterior of Madison Square Garden and are assaulted by the noise of a thousand cars and thousands of people hurrying to who knows what.

The first person I can’t forget seeing was a woman at the station splayed on the tile floor, dressed in a business suit, phone in hand, yelling in what seemed like distress. A man in a suit stood beside her, phone in hand, seemingly trying to calm her. Was she hurt? Was she angry? A policeman at a deli just 15 yards away turned and looked, then turned away.

Exiting onto the street, I avoided people trying to get my attention for their tours and shows. I walked in an ant column of pedestrians, past men on the left sitting with all their earthly belongings and a cup for donations. As I glanced at them, I almost stepped on another homeless person sleeping longways with the flow of pedestrians.

On one bench I saw a nerdy looking young man I thought was dead until his drunk friend awakened him from his stupor. I rubbed shoulders with a man in a leather jacket with an upside down cross and the words, “You are not my God.” At breakfast in my Airbnb, the host was streaming a 75-minute Buddhist service as I talked about my church.

At times it was overwhelming as I was confronted with a small fraction of the needs in the world—but a much much larger proportion than I see in a typical day. This was good for me. I know most New Yorkers grow numb to it, but it was healthy for me to be awakened from the numbness of my own routine, my own apathy toward the temporal and eternal needs near my home and work and church. There is very little I can do for the city of New York. But there are many things I can do for the small urban community in which I reside and worship, and many things I can do for the people there. Frankly, sometimes I go too long without thinking about them.

One thing I’ve learned is to not isolate oneself and one’s family too far from needs and problems. Otherwise it’s like some children who have grown up in super-clean environments and now have an array of bad allergies. On a regular basis we need to follow Jesus into areas of spiritual and physical need. To avoid doing so is not only to show apathy for people Christ values, but it is to bring harm upon ourselves and to turn attention to matters of less importance and lower priorities, even perverting our attitudes and watching our spiritual fires grow dim.

Regularly I need to board that train to Manhattan, even in my mind.