I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.-- Chandy

This week was a blast with the kids.. it started out with some regular hang out days at Rock Island and ended with a beautiful day at the zoo and competitive game of bowling today.

The zoo was amazing yesterday. It was perfect weather and the elementary kids were so excited. We took exactly 30 kids and about 25 of them had never been to the zoo before. It was so fun to witness each of them get so excited to see elephants, tigers and giraffes for the first time. The highlight of the day were the gorillas. They have so much personality and put on quite the show for us. One of the little 4 year old boys in my group said he wanted to take one home to be his friend.

Today was bowling.. we loaded up 20 middle school/high school kids and headed for a Mcdonalds lunch before hitting the lanes. And then the highlight of my day happened...

In the midst of the hustle and bustle at McDonalds with 20 kids ordering value meals, we some how got away with an extra Big Mac. I was about to throw it away when one of the boys, "Damien", chimed up, "I'll take it". I assumed he was really hungry and didn't think anything of it. After eating we all loaded up to head to the bowling alley. Luke was driving the van and I was driving my car. Damien was riding with me. As we were driving along to the bowling alley he yelled from the back seat, "Pull Over". I asked him why and he said that he had to do something. So I found a side street and pulled over. He hopped out with another one of the boys, "Jose" (who is very hard core and hard to reach), and went sprinting in the other direction. At this point I'm kind of panicked about what is going on. But as I glance in my rearview mirrow I realize that Damien has the Big Mac in his hand and Jose is holding an unopened Pepsi that he found in my back seat. Then I look at the target they are running for... a homeless man crouched in the bushes. I watch as they crouch down to his level, exchange a few words and hand him the hamburger and drink. Then I see a big grin and they shake his hand and come joggin back to the car. As soon as they got back in the car they said, "we made sure and said God bless you!". I was so proud of them. If you saw these two boys walking down the street you might assume they were running drugs or headed to hang out with their gang friends... but these two boys were headed down the side of the road to give something to eat to someone hungry.

"For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me." - Matthew 25:35-36

train a child - Luke

This past Monday at our elementary, after-school program I had a small glimpse of what our future may hold.

Ron, Chandy and I have had several discussions about how awesome it would be to have a worship time with our youth. We dream of starting our Thursday night Bible study with a 20-30 minute worship time. But, we have to deal with the reality that these kids have no idea what worship looks like. There are so many elements to worship that we know and have learned over the years that these kids haven't been exposed to. Alot of us take for granted our church-going upbringing. Regardless of what congregation, denomination or location we have attended in the past, we have learned, on one level or another, what "happens" during worship. Even with the upbringing that I was given there were certain modes of expression, action and qualities to worship that I wasn't exposed to until my post high-school/post college career. These kids have NO idea. (On top of all this, they don't know any songs, which is changing.)

What these kids know is they have to uphold their hard appearance, their cool reputation and at all costs retain all levels of respect from the other kids. As most of us know, with worship, there is a level of vulnerability. You have to put yourself aside. A primary action during worship is humbling oneself or making ourselves less so that we can give God praise as the #1 that He is. So, I say all of this just to show why we have struggled in the past with implementing a time of worship with our youth.

This past Christmas our elementary kids, under the guidance of Chandy, preformed a Christmas program. They dressed in costumes, ranging from a wise man to baby Jesus, sang 2-3 songs, read the birth of Jesus and two of the girls from the neighborhood put on a singing/dancing performance of a lifetime. This Easter the kids will be doing something similar. Over the last 3-4 weeks during the elementary, after-school time the kids have been practicing. Following a grueling 30 minute homework period and a small snack the kids gather around in a circle and practice for their upcoming performance by singing. The kids will be singing the chorus of "Savior, He Can Move the Mountains", with a worship group on Easter Sunday. Chandy started off by singing the first couple lines of the song to the kids and they would repeat her. After several weeks of practice the kids have the song down to a T.

This past Monday, after the kids proved they could sing the song in its' entirety, Chandy played a cd for the kids to listen and sing along with. The song was lead by a worship group performing the song they had been practicing. It was chilling. It was so cool to be able to sit there and imagine 5-10 years down the road when these kids are 11-17 years old and we are having a time of worship with them. There we were in the middle of Rock Island with 25 children singing a worship song. I tried to imagine our older kids doing the exact same thing and it was just really hard to imagine. Not to say that I am writing the older kids off for ever having a time of worship (let me add that some of our youth did experience a time of worship at a camp we attended last summer), but that it is so much more difficult to teach and train the kids once they pass a certain age or maturity level (revolutionary thought by me, huh?) What an incredible insight God had and gave us before we even existed...

Proverbs 22:6 -
"Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it."

It is going to be an awesome experience the day we are able to have a time of worship lead by our youth.

Everyone needs compassion
Love that’s never failing
Let mercy fall on me
Everyone needs forgiveness
The kindness of a Savior
The hope of nations

Chorus: Kids part
Savior, He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever, Author of Salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave

So take as You find me
All my fears and failures
Fill my life again
I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in
Now I surrender

Bridge:
Shine your light
And let the whole world see
We’re singing
For the glory of the risen King, Jesus

Scary Exteriors, Beautiful Interiors-- Chandy

I would say that frontline/inner-city ministry is one filled with lots of loss. Although we are beginning to get used to the overdoses, homeless freezing to death and stabbings, it doesn't make things hurt any less. When it comes to the homeless, it's sad to say that we might be their only accountability to still being alive. I've mentioned before that when one of our regulars doesn't show up for a few days, we really start to worry and even might go looking for them in alleys and abandoned houses. Here is just a short recap of 4 people in our staff prayer time this morning, I felt a lot of loss today. Pray for them too.

- Anthony- A homeless man we have known for a number of years. He and his girlfriend, Lily, usually stop in for some food or to use the phone about once a week. I've heard stories of fights he's been in and how mean of a man he is. I've never seen that side of him. We heard last night that he is in the hospital in a coma from getting beat up really bad. There is a good chance he won't make it.

- John- We call him John the Baptist. He is such a precious servant. He comes in every day and does fix-it kind of chores all around the mission. His years of addiction and homelessness have left him pretty rough looking, but he is such a beautiful soul. He sleeps under one of our houses but we haven't seen him since last Thursday and that worries us a lot.

- Lori- A former (and maybe non-former) homeless, prostitute. A few months ago she came in and gave a wallet-sized photo of herself to Luke. On the back she wrote, "thanks for the prayers". She died this weekend of a probable overdose.

- Michael- A homeless man who played college basketball at Arkansas-Pine Bluff. He has a special friendship with Luke. For the past year he has come every day. Usually with some request written on a small notecard. At one point he was actually pen pals with Luke's grandma so that he would have someone to talk to. For the past month or so Luke has been giving him candles everyday to burn overnight to keep his "hole" warm that he sleeps in. He even uses us as his own safety-deposit box. Whenever he has anything of worth he brings it to us to keep safe. We haven't seen him in about 3 weeks now. We don't know who to ask, because he has not one single friend or family member. Luke's been checking the obituaries.

I don't share all of that to make people sad who read this. I share it to put names with faces of people you might see sleeping in an alley or abandoned building. I share that to make sure we all remember that those scary exteriors often have beautiful interiors.

"The right thing to do"-- Chandy

This week has been absolutely crazy for all of us. Without getting into too many details quite yet, it looks as if one or more of the staff members could be adding children to their households permanently. I really feel like we are at a time right now when we've got to DO what we SAY. I know that if I truly believe all the things I blog about then I must act. Sometimes there is a struggle between reason/logic and "the right thing to do". For my own personal life... I pray that "the right thing to do" always wins out. I think being able to FEEL if something is right or wrong is evidence of spiritual discernment. Some people may call me crazy... but aren't we called as Christians to look crazy sometimes. Look at the disciples.. a lot of people back in the day thought they were insane. So I leave this short blog with two great quotes and a scripture.

- "Suffering isn't hard to come by, it's a prouct of sacrifice." (J. Paravane)


- "It is very important for us to realize that love, to be true, has to hurt. I must be willing to give whatever it takes not to harm other people and, in fact, to do good to them. This requires that I am willing to give until it hurts. Otherwise there is not true love in me, and I bring injustice, not peace, to those around me." (Mother Teresa)


- "Anyone who sets himself up as "religious" by talking a good game is self-deceived. This kind of religion is hot air and only hot air. Real religion, the kind that passes muster before God the Father, is this: Reach out to the homeless and loveless in their plight, and guard against corruption from the godless world." (James 1:26-27 The Message)