Our family watched the film The Blind Side last Sunday.  What a movie!   If you haven't seen the real-life story of Michael Oher, I urge you to see it soon.  A foster kid in Memphis ... who becomes a couch-surfing homeless teen … taken in by a Christian family … becomes a better student … a star football player … he graduates high school … I won't go any further but suffice it to say Mr. Oher is a healthy and lucratively-employed young man today.  Longtime readers of the Fancy Newsletter know that Marion County has one of the highest populations of foster kids in Oregon.  And we also have one of the most comprehensive and collaborative public/private responses to that need.  The good news is there are fewer kids in foster care and more churches involved in supporting foster families.

I’ll never forget the day pastor Dick Lucco called me into his office.  Dick was a founding board member of SLF.  For a couple years, his church—Trinity Covenant—had been sending folks to minister at the Oregon Capitol Inn, a hotel where 200 homeless people live.  In partnership with the School District and SLF, Trinity had a vibrant ministry at the Capitol Inn.  Crime was down, the place was cleaned up, kids could play outside again, there were healthy and educational activities for all.  But when Dick called me into his office, he said: “Sam, we’re pulling out of the Capitol Inn,” What?  The Trinity/Capitol-Inn partnership was one of our best demonstration projects to show churches and civic leaders the value of faith-based Servanthood.  How could Dick pull the plug?  He explained that he’d had an Epiphany.  Even though the effort at the Capitol Inn was working, it wasn’t the right calling for Trinity. A band of faithful servants was going downtown to serve, but the impact was not affecting the whole church.  The light-bulb Epiphany God gave Dick was this: there’s a whole neighborhood—a “parish” if you will—all around Trinity.  That’s where the church would serve, Dick had discerned.  

Kelly is a most unlikely neighborhood hero.  She’s a young adult who lives at home with her folks.  She volunteers in the SLF office twice a week, and sings in her church choir.  She is kind, gentle and a bit shy.  But she has the energy of the Bonneville Power Plant, as we have discovered in the Madison-McCoy area of north Salem.  For years, Kelly and her family were trapped inside their home due to a neighboring drug house.  They made occasional police calls, but didn’t realize other neighbors were concerned, too.  They felt isolated and powerless.  The drug dealers made frequent threats.  Noises all night long; a steady flow of drug customers during the day.  Kelly got fed up. 

A few weeks ago I ran into Bill and John. I should say that Bill ran into me—literally. Well, almost. I was standing on the corner of Chemeketa and Church talking with Mark Bulgin of Isaac’s Room/IKEbox. We felt a swoosh of wind on our right—a car blew by us on the sidewalk and missed us by six inches! It continued on across Chemeketa and plowed right into a light pole. Mark and I were the first to reach the luxury car—Mark on his cell phone dialing 911; me yanking on the door handle. There was an older man inside—Bill—his eyes glazed over. The doors were locked, and he couldn’t hit the switch despite my pleas. A big crowd gathered. Suddenly a ragged street teen—John—appeared and began pounding on the windows.

I’m working with a young dad named Jason*.  This month is his one-year anniversary for getting out of jail.  As an “ex-offender,” he’s not what most people probably imagine . . . he has two jobs, he successfully got his kids back from foster care, and he’s rebuilding both his credit and his driving privileges.  Jason is determined to make it.  And SLF is proud to walk alongside him.  But here’s what we’ve learned:  the “system” and “society” put so many barriers in front of folks like Jason, it’s an absolute miracle they make it.  For example, the DMV wouldn’t take one SLF check for four fees, they had to have four separate checks.  Not easy for a guy who can’t have a checking account (yet—we’re working on that with our neighborhood bank.)  The SR-22 insurance companies wanted to charge twice what my insurance-agent friend is charging Jason to get reinsured. 

He was outside church one Sunday.  Smoking a cigarette with several others who seemed nervous.  A little boy with a balloon was crying.  Part of me wanted to say ‘hi,’ another part of me didn’t want to intrude.  Our family walked inside and the boys headed off to their fellowship groups.  Something nudged me back outside.  Rats—they were gone!  I walked around the church—there they were, at another door.  Still nervous.  The boy wasn’t crying any-more, so I said “hey, that’s a neat balloon.”  “I got it at the shelter,” he said.  I introduced myself to Gary, Ken, Warren, little Colin and his mom.  “Are you guys heading in?”  I asked.  Gary said yes—after finishing their smokes they were going to head up to the balcony.  I gave Colin a high-five and re-joined Jennifer.  After the service I saw Gary and the group.  We enjoyed hot chocolates and a conversation about how the buses don’t run on Sundays, which makes it hard for many folks to get to church.  The conversation turned to work: Gary’s a construction flagger, but didn’t have a valid card.  Had to take a class.  How much?  75 bucks and a bus pass.  Long story short, Gary (and Ken) are now certified as flaggers and finding work.  Warren now has his cab-driving license and is taking steps to get his kids back from foster care.  In a way, it was easy:  heed the nudge, say ‘hi,’ listen, and act. 

Martha* was walking to the store for some milk.  It had been a rough week.  Even though she and Felix* were clean-and-sober again, it was tough living in a $700 motorhome . . . on the lot where their burned-out home once stood.  They desperately missed their toddler David* who had been taken into foster care.  Treatment and recovery were going OK, but something was lacking.  Their rebound was fragile . . .  

Last Sunday our family heard Jennifer Harris speak.  I love to hear Jennifer speak.  She’s a pastor from Pucallpa, Peru, and we are honored to support her missionary work there.  Jennifer spoke at our church the same day a big news article on her 12-year ministry was published in the Statesman Journal.  Jennifer, a Salem native, has strong support from local partners (yay!).  The room was packed and Jennifer amazed us with photos and stories from the jungles of Peru.  Jennifer’s church—Luz Divina—raises up local pastors and has planted 25 sister churches in a ‘string-of-pearls’ stretching upriver in the rain forest.  Last year the mother church in Pucallpa built a new facility that not only serves the congregation, but the surrounding neighborhood (sound familiar?).  In fact, it was also built to be a shared worship center for all the churches in the city, many of which have teensy meeting halls.  What a model of unity and cooperation!

“It’s all so clear to me now!”   Thus uttered a recent guest on the ‘Fancy Field Trip.’  It took us 13 years, but we’ve finally figured out a clear-and-compelling way to ‘show and tell’ what SLF does.  More importantly, it’s a powerful tool for demonstrating how churches are working with schools, neighborhoods and myriad partners to help Salem-Keizer become the healthiest community in Oregon.  Remember, SLF doesn’t run any programs. Our job is to 1) build bridges and 2) showcase partnerships, especially those involving the faith community.  There are 200-250 congregations in our community, and we’re hoping each one will engage in meaningful servanthood to kids, families and neighborhoods.   So far there are more than 90 . . . at least by our latest count.  We’re always looking for more examples of ‘faith in action’ and we love to gather the stories.