These internal conversations have me thinking about those days and what would bother me more, to risk much and live adventurously and fail or to play it safe, avoid the bold risky moves and be “successful”.  For me, I want to live an adventure the kind of life that means something. 

I am drawn to movies and books that are epic tales of long hard journeys where the unlikely hero overcomes the odds and writes his own story changing the course of history.  In each of the stories there are defining moments where the hero faces his fears, takes a risk, or make the bold move to change the story.

As a community (kingdom) development person I have learned that the bold moves and risky decisions are some of the most satisfying experiences in the adventure called life.  Taking life by the horns, holding on for dear life and see where the ride takes you.  8 years into living this adventure, I am learning that there is a need for more adventurers.  People that are willing to choose an non traditional path to live, work, and ministry. 

Over the next year I will be recruiting some other young families to come and live boldly and start an adventure of community transformation that will have the biggest impact on those willing to take on the epic adventure we call life.  I am excited to build a team of young leaders that share this journey with each other and with the families and young people that our lives intersect with as we seek His Kingdom coming together.

Running a ministry to children you learn very early on that people give to the things that warm their heart and feel good to them. Giving a toy to a child is an easy way to satisfy that feeling at Christmas. The challenge for a ministry that is also working to minister to, feed, love on, tutor, and build relationships year round is that most giving happens at the Christmas season.
This leads to a real challenge, how do you keep a ministry going year round when 2/3 of all giving happens at Christmas.

This year this is especially true. We have had a great year in ministry, God has been faithful to see us through, but a challenging year financially. We had one major donation for tutoring, that was lost because of a civil war in Africa. That loss was significant and moved us from our most successful to most challenging year ever. We have weathered that storm, but we know that we have a major challenge on our hands for 2012.

Finding a replacement in training for pastor Phil is going to be tough. Finding the right fit, with the right talents, with the right calling, is going to be hard enough. Imagine doing it with no money to pay that person. We realize that this year we have to find a way to pay for Christmas gifts, but bigger than this we realize that we need to find a way to pay both our current Heaventrain pastor and the successor(s).

The challenge is to try to cover Christmas, the short term need, without forgetting the long term need of finding a new leader to develop for Heaventrain. One takes care of the warm feeling in our hearts, and the other sets up the next generation of ministry to future generations.

This has weighed heavily on our hears this year. Saturday on Heaventrain we taught a lesson about giving vs. receiving. A five year old little boy came up to my dad after the service and places 87 cents in his hand and said, “I want to give this to Heaventrain.”

This little boy gave all that he had. It was a sacrifice to him and he invested it in a place that he saw great value. We have all been encouraged that if a little on sees the value in what we have been doing all these years and is willing to give so that it can continue, so does God.

Not sure how these things will be worked out. We are not very good at raising money, nobody on our staff feels comfortable with the high pressure nature of ministry fund raising, but we know that God has a plan for Christmas and beyond and that He can use a little 5 year old boy to remind us that He can move in the hearts of people in order to keep His work moving forward.

It is hard to keep pushing when you are told no for a grant because you don’t have a building, or the idea is too theoretical, or because I don’t understand what or why you this. We feel proud when folks say, we don’t like why you do what you do, or who you do it for or to. We are even more proud when the little boy says, “I want to give.”

There are many people walking around with heavy hearts because of job loss, health concerns, the stress of life and seem to be looking for something to fill the void. This verse is clear that often time the only thing that can bring life and hope is to see something we long for realized.

The question now becomes, how do you engage someone who has given up hope and not only invite them to dream again, but work to see that dream fulfilled. We have been wrestling with that question for many years and are starting to see some folks walking out the desires of their heart for their family and community.

We have found a special mix between asset based community development, neighbor organizing, relationship building, and walking out dreams together. I can tell you that seeing something materialize breathes life into a group of people, they learn to dream together and new life fills the room as hope returns.

The question for those who have lost hope and feel despair is, what is your dream and what do you want to do about it.

We also launched an Aspiring Leaders Academy this summer.  We are partnering with several other groups to lead young people in a leadership development program that aims to build on their skills and interests.  We focus on team building and personal responsibility as the cornerstones of a better community.  The kids are going to begin planning a way to give back as part of the community.  Our hope here is to bring in Brice Rapp to close the year teaching the young people how to build and maintain their own bicycle.  We need to get about 25 used bikes to serve as donors for parts and frames.  Almost any style of bike can be used.

Lastly, we are knees deep in our summer nutrition program.  We have spent the last several years trying to build this effort as a labor of love for our kids.  There are much larger organizations feeding much larger groups of kids.  They focus on quantity of students and are able to generate large profits by cutting costs of food quality.  We have worked hard to push the limits of what is possible.  When you focus on quality, the financial issues are challenging and the truth is that most people could care less about the quality of food that is given.  This year we have heard two major votes of confidence.  First, one of our partners asked why the kids keep walking almost a mile and past three other summer feeding sites to get to outs.  “I see 47 kids walk past three other sites each day to get to your site”, why is this happening?  A little girl answered her question, “When I eat at the other sites, the food does not taste as good, and I feel sick afterward”  (she called the sandwich served a “Gut Bomb” because it gives her gas.  She then said, I look forward to the heavetrain food, the fruit is better, the milk is fresher, and the hot meal tastes so much better, and I don’t feel sick after.”  She then asked, “Why can’t everyone feed us food like that?”  It has been challenging to push the limits of quality food, but we do it out of love for our kids.  Love always trumps profit and quality alway trups quantity, I am very encouraged that this quality speaks for itself.

Our tutoring project is slated to start in September at Carl and Lewis Stokes academy.  We are changing strategy here by moving from a High School focus to a elementary focus.  The ability to control the environment is a key factor here and the idea is to help younger students develop a love of learning will help them get ahead rather than to help high school students catch up.  This work will be taking place from 9 to 2 Monday – Thursday and will be divided into two two hour shifts from 9 to 11 and 12 to 2.  We are in search of tutors that can offer at least one shift per week for the upcoming school year.

This is a test run of the Video Blog option.

The next thing that was really challenging was in terms of our financial support.  Last year we had a great partner commit to give 25 thousand dollars a year for 5 years.  This pledge was going to allow us the time to work with two classes of students and track them all the way through high school and to gather the data to show that our plan is in fact helping students not only stay in school, but reverse the trend of high drop outs and low scores.  The amazing part of the pledge was that it was originated by a missionary in Africa started the pledge and helped raise other support to make this work.  For the better part of the last year the Ivory Coast has experienced civil unrest that has kept this promise from being realized.  The loss of $25 thousand this year and $125 thousand over the next 5 has been a serious blow and threatens the future of the project.
Now that we are clear that the project has seen it fair share of challenges, let me get to the results.  We started with 30 students, and finished the year with 15 students.  Of the 15 that finished the project we were able to exit test 12 students.  The average student was tested at the beginning of the program reading at a 3rd grade 5th month level.  Each student had a face to face one on one tutor that worked on reading curriculum and then spent time reading to each other twice a week.  The students were able to read many types of books that covered all kinds of topics and many were more to their level than we would want, but they engaged students with real life issues and with things they deal with every day.  Drugs, sex, violence, gangs, prison, pear pressure, and other topics were able to be discussed with a caring adult.

All of this is important as relationships with caring adults are in short supply for many kids.  The real impact of the relationships can never be measured with a test, but our students, their teachers, their tutors have all seen a huge change in the behavior and attitude of each student.  Where we can test is in the reading comprehension and skills, the average student gained 3 1/2 grade levels this year.  That means that students that were reading at a third grade level have now closed the gap to read at a 7th grade level.  Of the students that we have worked with for two years, they have now caught up with their current grade level (in two years) from 3rd grade to 10th in two years.  This is nothing short of astonishing, and for those kids it is a life changer.

The challenges make the year feel like a failure, our inability to find a way to cover the cost of the project have been an ongoing source of stress and frustration.  I can tell you that only when you walk with Jesus can you fall on your face and change the lives of young people forever.  If this is failure, I will take it every time.

Now to sort out what next year looks like and if we can continue this effort.

The reasons people honk can be as simple to pick up a friend to go out to a club or it can be a signal for a prostitute or drug deal.  One thing is for sure nobody appreciates a honking horn.  At times we have to turn lights on, let the dogs out, or even call the police to clear things up.

On this occasion things were much more interesting.  As she looked outside she said in a puzzled voice, there is a man in your truck.  I think there is a man in your truck.  I looked, and sure enough there was a man honking the horn in MY TRUCK.  So I jumped up and headed outside, as I approached the window there was a terrified man sitting in the driver seat of the truck.  I am stuck in here, he said.  I know, I said. The truck has an anti left system and now that you are in, it will only let you out with the keypad.  He then asked me to call the police to get him out.  As I left the scene to grab my shoes.

As the police came he had my cell phone car charger around his neck and a folder from the Central Promise Neighborhood project.  The police asked him what these items were and he said they were his and that the cell phone charger was his key for HIS TRUCK.  I had to laugh at the image of this man lost in his own world trying to get my charger to start HIS TRUCK.

Now I can tell you that there are many times that I feel lost these days.  Trying to get what seems like the “Keys to my situation” to work on what ever problems and struggles I have at the time only to get frustrated by the fact that my keys are not working.  I only wish that there was a horn to push to alert those around me that I can use their help.  At least the guy in the truck knew that if he made enough noise, help would come.  Maybe the idea that help often comes with discipline or correction is why we are sometimes unwilling to wake the neighbors.

The news hits deep and is a double edged sword in that it shakes my confidence, but it will ultimately have a big impact on the lives of our kids. Not only does it feel like a professional failure, but knowing the cost it feels like we are letting kids down, and that is personal. These are not kids that are statistics, but they are kids that we are deeply connected to and the news will be very personal to some.

There is also the personal embarrassment of realizing that a huge success now becomes a huge struggle. A story that was the cause for confidence and seemed to validate our hard work and a big risk has swung in a whole other direction. As a person of faith, I feel smashed because doing the right thing in the face of big risk feels great when things come together. It would be OK if you took your best shot and failed, but to take the risk and believe that it paid off validates something deep inside, but to have that moment lost, makes the failure so much more painful.

Today as I ponder the past and the future, I can’t help, but feel like a fool. If I could find a cave to crawl into, I would be there for a while. The reality of your limitations and failures can be humbling, but when you feel like your faith was foolishness, it is hard to trust yourself to make any move. Where is that cave?

Here is to hoping that there is still another turn in this tale.