"If you could do anything"...

"If you could do anything with your life, what would it be?"

My friend paused and closed her eyes.

"I love to help people.  I love to share love, joy, and hope.  I want to share those things at a job.  I have always wanted to be a home-based care giver."

She has worked as a house-cleaner for the last 10 years.  She is intelligent, sweet, inquisitive, and determined.  One of her first weeks in our home, I asked if she wanted to have coffee and do devotions with me before we both started work.  It became an anticipated weekly tradition.

My heart just about lurched out of my chest as she shared her dream with me.  A home-based care giver?  Lord, this is all making sense now!  The Lord is infinitely wise and sovereign.  Her dream wasn't outlandish.

It just so happens that the Genesis hospice runs a 6 week home-based care training course to meet the increasing demand for care-givers in response to the local HIV and AIDS epidemic.  Trainees spend four weeks in a classroom setting learning about sanitation and care-giving and then two weeks in a practical at the hospice.  Upon completion, they receive a certificate and can seek employment through local hospitals or individual care.  On a deeper level, trainees are invested in by a staff who loves Christ.

Within a matter of weeks, my friend's dream was being recognized and we were able to connect her with the training program.  She got 6 weeks off work (in hopes of never returning to house cleaning).  Sam and I get to see her on Genesis campus where she is in her 2nd week of training.  For those of you who support the Genesis outreach efforts, her story is one of many.  I will miss our weekly time together but rejoice that the Lord is providing her with something better.  Thank you again for sending us here in support of these efforts!

First day of training!

"Not to us, O lord, not to us

but to your name be the glory,

because of your love and faithfulness."

Psalm 115:1

Where men may flourish...

Yes, please, try to convince me that ballroom dancing for rugby boys has a place in ministry.

The boys who come to the Genesis Vikings Christian Rugby Academy represent a wide variety of socio-economic backgrounds, life skills preparation, and educational privilege (or lack thereof).  After a year or two of intense physical training and spiritual discipleship at Genesis, some go on to a much different life than they came from.  

The men who spear-headed the rugby academy have a heart not only to see these boys grow spiritually and physically.  Christ's compassion motivates them to see these boys flourish.

"What if these boys get invited to a wedding someday?  They better know how to dance!", mused Pastor Trevor Downham.

Indeed.  What if their success in rugby launches them into an entirely different world, as it already has with some of our boys?  Won't they need to know how to attend a fancy dinner, balance a check book, and be good stewards of their money?  What life skills can we, as a church, build in these boys to see them FLOURISH?  Doesn't "loving your neighbor as yourself" go beyond the big things and seep into the little things in life?

And so life skills were added to the physical and spiritual training of the Vikings Rugby boys' regimen.  From banking to ballroom dancing.