Showing posts with label urban ministry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label urban ministry. Show all posts
Monday, March 30, 2015
Thursday, February 05, 2015
Opportunity in Denver
Thanks to an invitation from His Hands Christian Ministries, CitySquare has been connecting to the Denver community for almost a year.
Johnny and Susie Davis founded this amazingly compassionate and welcoming non-profit organization in March 2008. Since that time, His Hands has grown in reach, scope and capacity.
Last year CitySquare and His Hands reached an agreement that promises to further expand the overall effectiveness of the Denver effort. Now known as CitySquare Denver, the team operates a large food and clothing distribution center and more for low-income, working families, as well as for homeless persons.
Last summer CitySquare's Food on the Move initiative served about 300 meals each day throughout the summer to Denver school children who qualified for the free and reduced meal program in public schools.
Now CitySquare intends to launch a comprehensive program of community and human development that will, from the beginning, attempt to find ways to support already functional efforts on the ground in Denver. As in Dallas, we will listen to "the poor," seek out partners already at work and innovate to achieve greater outcomes from our "customers," both neighbors in need and partners working alongside us.
Our first step is to find a Denver leader. We are looking for a person who shares our mission of battling the causes and effects of poverty through service, advocacy and friendship. We are looking for a mission-driven leader with an "entrepreneurial soul."
If you know anyone who would be interested in providing aggressive leadership to our Denver efforts, please let me know by email at ljames@CitySquare.org. I'll be pleased to share a job description. I can't wait to visit with interested, potential leaders.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Friday, August 27, 2010
"Opportunity Center" progress
Seems like time to provide a brief update on the development of our new "Opportunity Center" located on a 4-acre tract at the corner of Malcolm X Boulevard and I-30.
The new center will include a new, expanded health clinic; a large wellness center; a versatile commercial production kitchen designed to instruct neighbors in healthy food preparation and training in culinary arts; robust employment training programs delivered in partnership with Workforce Solutions of Greater Dallas; an expanded food distribution center; a retail grocery store; a community garden and other training and life-improvement options.
Our initial partners in the endeavor include the Embrey Family Foundation, whose gift allowed us to assemble the property and PepsiCo whose commitment to improving the lives of urban residents has been extremely motivational for us. Numerous other philanthropists have joined the endeavor to move us to about the halfway mark in our funding efforts, including the Sowell Family Foundation, the Rees-Jones Foundation, the Halbert Family Foundation, Bank of America with others in process. Much more on this in coming days.
For today here are some images from the site.
The new center will include a new, expanded health clinic; a large wellness center; a versatile commercial production kitchen designed to instruct neighbors in healthy food preparation and training in culinary arts; robust employment training programs delivered in partnership with Workforce Solutions of Greater Dallas; an expanded food distribution center; a retail grocery store; a community garden and other training and life-improvement options.
Our initial partners in the endeavor include the Embrey Family Foundation, whose gift allowed us to assemble the property and PepsiCo whose commitment to improving the lives of urban residents has been extremely motivational for us. Numerous other philanthropists have joined the endeavor to move us to about the halfway mark in our funding efforts, including the Sowell Family Foundation, the Rees-Jones Foundation, the Halbert Family Foundation, Bank of America with others in process. Much more on this in coming days.
For today here are some images from the site.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Monday, March 09, 2009
Check It Out: 14th Annual Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast!
If you live in Texas or anywhere near it, you should plan on attending this year's annual urban ministries prayer breakfast!
Have a look right here!
Make your plans today:
. . .buy a table
. . .commit to be a sponsor
. . .order indivdiual tickets
. . .tell your friends and associates!
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Have a look right here!
Make your plans today:
. . .buy a table
. . .commit to be a sponsor
. . .order indivdiual tickets
. . .tell your friends and associates!
.
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Check out latest CDM Online Magazine!
For an updated look into our world at Central Dallas Ministries, go here.
Love to hear your feedback!
When you're done with this issue, why not pass it along to someone else?
Thanks!
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Saturday, January 17, 2009
Urban Connection--San Antonio
Six years ago, Central Dallas Ministries planted an urban ministry outpost in San Antonio.
We started with a great leader, Leslie Kelsie-Grubbs and a strategic location, Lincoln Heights Courts on the tough west side of this important city. We called our new operation Urban Connection--San Antonio.
Today the ministry thrives. Last last year, UC--SA became an independent non-profit corporation when it received its 501 ( c ) 3 status. The organizational by-laws direct that CDM will always seat two members on the board of directors. So, CDM will continue to be involved in a very hands-on way with UC--SA.
Read more about the progress in the San Antonio newspaper today.
Check out the UC--SA website here.
Congratulations to Leslie and the entire UC--SA team!
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We started with a great leader, Leslie Kelsie-Grubbs and a strategic location, Lincoln Heights Courts on the tough west side of this important city. We called our new operation Urban Connection--San Antonio.
Today the ministry thrives. Last last year, UC--SA became an independent non-profit corporation when it received its 501 ( c ) 3 status. The organizational by-laws direct that CDM will always seat two members on the board of directors. So, CDM will continue to be involved in a very hands-on way with UC--SA.
Read more about the progress in the San Antonio newspaper today.
Check out the UC--SA website here.
Congratulations to Leslie and the entire UC--SA team!
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Friday, October 24, 2008
"So, where's the ministry?"
It happens to me again and again.
Always it involves church people.
It can be in the midst of or at the end of a site visit/tour. Most recently, it occurred in a meeting with a large church's board of elders.
It goes something like this.
I describe in great detail all that we are doing. Or, I escort folks around the inner city to see site after site where we are working with very poor people.
Included in almost every tour or discussion is exposure to our community health services, our public interest law firm, our after-school academy, our affordable housing developments, our 15-story building in Downtown where homeless folks will live, our summer and after-school lunch program, our food distribution center, the one-stop shop that serves the needs of youth who "age out" of the foster care system, the Central Dallas Church, our AmeriCorps efforts, the list goes on.
These efforts touch thousands of individuals and families.
Eventually, someone feels the need to ask the question.
"So, Larry, where does the ministry happen?"
Translation: where do you "share the gospel," "close the sale," "call people to convert to Jesus," "invite people to pray that Jesus would come into their hearts and 'get saved?'"
The question betrays a couple of fundamental misunderstandings.
First, it ignores the fact that 95%-plus of our neighbors already claim that they are Christians. Like everyone, their lives are not problem free or without challenge--now there is understatement! But, the vast, vast majority of the people we touch cling to faith in Jesus as one of their only certain assets. Often, our friends in the community point us to God, a very powerful dynamic to experience.
Second, there is power in the humility of voiceless engagement. I've said over and over again that at Central Dallas Ministries we tend to adopt a Franciscan approach to our work. Saint Francis told his followers to "Preach the gospel at all times. Use words only when necessary."
This is our approach.
But, in my opinion--and it is an opinion shaped by my day-to-day experience over the last 15 years--there is something else going on here with many church leaders and members, something back of the common question so many ask.
In a strange way, "evangelism" and concerns framed by it provide people of faith a nice, respectable barrier, a secure place behind which to hide. Staying in this place of "safety" is not as costly or as dangerous as addressing the evil that keeps people and families shut out, left behind and in perpetual distress.
Frankly, focusing on more traditional "church stuff," as a primary concern in inner city neighborhoods where people battle extreme poverty, is not as personally demanding as facing and actively grappling with the facts of life among the urban poor.
Church folk from the outside, who come to the city with an agenda, often, no, usually, do not stay.
Evangelism, especially when imported from outside the community, has a way of placing the evangelist in a position of power, control and status above the target (at least in the evangelist's own mind!).
Community work is all about incarnation, and I think we know where that leads!
But embracing people in their communities, on their terms is how change happens. And, in this embrace we always find "the ministry."
.
Always it involves church people.
It can be in the midst of or at the end of a site visit/tour. Most recently, it occurred in a meeting with a large church's board of elders.
It goes something like this.
I describe in great detail all that we are doing. Or, I escort folks around the inner city to see site after site where we are working with very poor people.
Included in almost every tour or discussion is exposure to our community health services, our public interest law firm, our after-school academy, our affordable housing developments, our 15-story building in Downtown where homeless folks will live, our summer and after-school lunch program, our food distribution center, the one-stop shop that serves the needs of youth who "age out" of the foster care system, the Central Dallas Church, our AmeriCorps efforts, the list goes on.
These efforts touch thousands of individuals and families.
Eventually, someone feels the need to ask the question.
"So, Larry, where does the ministry happen?"
Translation: where do you "share the gospel," "close the sale," "call people to convert to Jesus," "invite people to pray that Jesus would come into their hearts and 'get saved?'"
The question betrays a couple of fundamental misunderstandings.
First, it ignores the fact that 95%-plus of our neighbors already claim that they are Christians. Like everyone, their lives are not problem free or without challenge--now there is understatement! But, the vast, vast majority of the people we touch cling to faith in Jesus as one of their only certain assets. Often, our friends in the community point us to God, a very powerful dynamic to experience.
Second, there is power in the humility of voiceless engagement. I've said over and over again that at Central Dallas Ministries we tend to adopt a Franciscan approach to our work. Saint Francis told his followers to "Preach the gospel at all times. Use words only when necessary."
This is our approach.
But, in my opinion--and it is an opinion shaped by my day-to-day experience over the last 15 years--there is something else going on here with many church leaders and members, something back of the common question so many ask.
In a strange way, "evangelism" and concerns framed by it provide people of faith a nice, respectable barrier, a secure place behind which to hide. Staying in this place of "safety" is not as costly or as dangerous as addressing the evil that keeps people and families shut out, left behind and in perpetual distress.
Frankly, focusing on more traditional "church stuff," as a primary concern in inner city neighborhoods where people battle extreme poverty, is not as personally demanding as facing and actively grappling with the facts of life among the urban poor.
Church folk from the outside, who come to the city with an agenda, often, no, usually, do not stay.
Evangelism, especially when imported from outside the community, has a way of placing the evangelist in a position of power, control and status above the target (at least in the evangelist's own mind!).
Community work is all about incarnation, and I think we know where that leads!
But embracing people in their communities, on their terms is how change happens. And, in this embrace we always find "the ministry."
.
Monday, February 04, 2008
Wild idea follow-up. . .Monkey Survey
Help me out.
Follow this link to a Monkey Survey about new ways of "doing church" and connection to the inner city.
Spend two minutes on the survey. It will really help me out!
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=ucHpqg1dtL6K9GqmJ1ICWw_3d_3d
Thanks!
.
Follow this link to a Monkey Survey about new ways of "doing church" and connection to the inner city.
Spend two minutes on the survey. It will really help me out!
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=ucHpqg1dtL6K9GqmJ1ICWw_3d_3d
Thanks!
.
Friday, February 01, 2008
Will you pray for Dallas?
Please join us for Central Dallas Ministries'
13th Annual Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast
TOGETHER FOR THE CITY
Keynote Speaker,
Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert,
will present his vision for the inner city.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
7:15 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.
(check-in begins at 6:30 a.m.)
Hilton Anatole Hotel - Khmer Ballroom
2201 Stemmons Freeway
Dallas, Texas
Tickets ($50) and Tables ($500) are available at:
http://www.dallasprayerbreakfast.org/
For more information, call Lisa Goolsby at
214-823-8710 x 138.
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