Monday, May 31, 2010

Behind Every Door Vision Video

Check out this short video about the Behind Every Door Vision.  Enjoy!



To learn more, visit www.behindeverydoor.com.

-- Behind Every Door

Friday, May 28, 2010

Community Center Open House for Parents


...and yes...they did get Mrs. Suzanne out on the dance floor!

Monday, May 24, 2010

Tutoring Program


So excited to see Jayda (Willow Pond resident) tutoring in the Community Center this evening! 

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Welcome, Jayda!

Behind Every Door is excited to welcome Jayda Ekundayo to our team as the Director of Children's Education at Willow Pond Apartments.  Jayda is a Willow Pond resident. Welcome!

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Mercy


"How blest  are they who show mercy; mercy shall be shown to them."

Jesus

Monday, May 17, 2010

Cookies and Compassion

Compassion was the theme last week at the Willow Pond Kids Club. With the tag line: “Healing the hurts of others.”

There is a man who lives alone in one of the apartments near the basketball court. He has often been harassed by the kids and vice-versa. Then, one day, some of the kids threw rocks at him.

The solution? Cookies and a card. The kids made the cookies in the Community Center themselves. The card included an apology. And the cookies were, well, because everyone likes cookies!

Two weeks earlier, we decided to jump in the golf cart for a little “prayer drive” around the property. We also do “prayer walks” but on this day a drive sounded better. We had gotten a dozen chocolate chip cookies from the Subway across the street to take with us for whoever we met.

The first person we saw was a man digging through a dumpster for cans. He had a mostly-full bag of cans in hand. When we pulled up, he was sure that we were coming to remove him from the property.

So, he seemed mildly surprised when our first words were: “Want a cookie?”

He came over and we loaded him on the back of the golf cart to drive him to the next dumpster. On the way we began to learn his story. Kenneth was his name. Kenneth was well-spoken and easy going.

We asked him about his relationship with his family…to which he replied: “I’ve been a big disappointment.”

His father is now deceased but he has a grandfather—who he does not see. When he talked about his grandfather, he said, “He has lots of grandchildren—it’s not a big deal (that Kenneth is not around).”

And he followed up by saying it again. “I’ve been a big disappointment.”

Then he asked for another cookie.

I hope we can be a mouthpiece for our compassionate God. This temporary home of ours is chalk-full of disappointment, pain, and broken hearts. And then there is our God who “bindeth up the broken hearts.” Our God is “gracious and compassionate. Slow to anger and rich in love.” (Psalm 145:8).

We invited Kenneth to come see us again and to feel free to look for cans.  We hope we see him again.

Back to the man who lives next to the basketball court. Salco, former rock-thrower-in-chief, asked if he could be the deliverer of the cookies (for more on Salco, see the blog entry entitled “What’s in a Name?”) So, Suzanne and some of the kids ventured to the apartment by the basketball court. Suzanne asked the man if she could pray for him. He said yes, but first wanted to go get his Bible!

She prayed for him. And in one little corner of the world, there was less rock throwing and more compassion.

-- Dean Wilson and Will Dowell

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Phillip Macedonia: Still Singing

One of the (amazing) stories from my experience at apartments in Fort Worth in 2009 is the story of Phillip Macedonia.  Below is an article I wrote about him for Eagle Mountain Lake Living Magazine.


Phillip Macedonia: Still Singing 

He loves to sing. Especially Thai love songs. A friend of his described the style of music as “kind of like country western.”

When I tell you Phillip Macedonia’s story…you might be surprised that he is still singing.

His life began in Laos. After fighting for four years in the Vietnam War and spending some time in a refugee camp in Thailand, he ended up coming to the United States. He’ll show you two wounds from where he was shot in the war. On one leg he can show you where one bullet entered, and where it exited.

Phillip and his family were advised to leave Laos by the CIA—told that the Communists may harm them if they stayed. After the Communist takeover of Laos in 1975, many citizens and members of the military suspected of aiding the enemy were killed (Phillip estimates over 100,000 were killed.

Then, Phillip and his family members were almost denied entrance to the United States because they didn’t know their birth dates. To this day, Phillip’s driver’s license reads “1/3/50.” I think his brother and sister were 1/1 and 1/2…birthdays assigned by U.S. immigration officials. Phillip doesn’t know exactly how old he is.

But, they made it to the United States in 1980. And Phillip worked hard for 12 years—as an office cleaner and in other jobs—building up a nest egg for his retirement.

In November 1992, Phillip’s house was set on fire. Police officials told Phillip it was likely started by a family member with the hope of taking life insurance money. Phillip was burned. Badly. 80% of his body was burned. He was in a coma for 10 months. His heart stopped 17 times. He weighed 168 pounds before the fire and 80 after. His hands are badly damaged--his fingers a little over half the size they were. He had a heart attack, likely caused by bad medicine. One doctor pronounced him dead…but then they somehow got his heart started again. “They pounded on me too much…got it going again,” he says with a smile.

As he lay in a coma, family members emptied his bank account using his identification and forging his signature. His life savings of $33,000 went to zero. Two family members later spent time in jail.

He now lives on very modest Social Security income with the help of some donated food.

Good grief, I thought. How much can one guy take in life? Apparently, a lot. Because Phillip Macedonia and I laughed for a good portion of the time we spent together.

I asked him if he would like to use a computer at the new Community Center at the apartment community where he lives if we got one. I had forgotten about his hands. He held them both up in front of me and laughed hysterically.

I asked, "What do you like to do?" "Read the Bible," he said. So, I said, if we had a Bible in the Community Center maybe we could read it together? He said yes. In fact, he said, "I would love to do that." As we talked, he proceeded to rattle off Scripture references about various topics as if he wrote the thing.

I asked Phillip about a lot of subjects. Were you angry at the people who burned you? “Yes,” he says. Are you angry now? “No. I forgive them.” Were you angry at God? “No. God didn’t make me burn. God loves me.” It’s as simple as that.

Are you sad about all of these terrible things that have happened? “I was so sad before. I am not sad now.”

His longtime friend Chai Voraritskul relayed: “Phillip lives a very peaceful, simple, straightforward life.”

I talked with Phillip about heaven. Are you afraid of dying? “No.” I guess a man who has endured what he has is likely not afraid of anything. Are you looking forward to having a new body in heaven? “Oh yes.” He holds up his shriveled, short fingers in front of me and says: “In heaven, this will change. I will have a new body. No more ugly. I will have a nice new body.”

Shot, burned, and robbed. Heart stopped 17 times. Pronounced dead. 93 surgeries. To call Phillip Macedonia a survivor would be quite an understatement. He’s a survivor…with a song in his heart.

-- Dean Wilson

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

The Last Shall be First

The last shall be first. That is the moral of the story.

On Monday, we began our “Real Men” of Willow Pond meeting with a simple question:

“Who said, ‘the last shall be first?’”

The boys threw out some answers and then one shouted “Jesus.” Good answer.

We continued. What does that look like? Who do we serve? How do we serve?

They responded. “My mom,” one shouted.

”Good! How can you serve your mom?”

“Clean the dishes!”

That’s great, how else?

“Take the trash to the dumpster.”

One of the boys, Joe, spontaneously said, “We can serve our wife!” He was making this comment on the heels of our reviewing the friendship/courtship/marriage/procreation sequence. Joe’s thought was a brilliant thought that, if embraced, makes me wonder if the Christian divorce rate would be better than 50%.

We then encouraged a plan. A friend Dallas Willard once began his Westmont College Chapel Sermon by asking: “What is your plan to become like Jesus? You do have one, don’t you?”

The bad news for me was “No.” And so we’ve since given that some thought. We’ll come up with a plan to cut and edge the front grass, but we won’t think strategically about following the King of the Universe.

Whoever comes up with a plan to serve their mom/family will be rewarded, we told them.

And with that, we let them go play.

About 5 minutes later one of the boys came to show us his plan. It was a piece of notebook paper, folded in half, with a title on the front that read “My how I plan to serve book.” When we opened it, he had outlined 4 points for how he planned to serve his mom:

1. I will take out the trash
2. I will wash the dishes
3. I will serve my mom
4. I will clean the house

We applauded him. We also told him this would be hard work.

And if he doesn’t deliver 100%, that is OK! If he sets out to do the above, and he scores 20%, that is absolutely incredible news. Because that would mark a shift of monumental proportions. The world wants him to serve himself, get whatever he can, and mark his “success” by how he feels.

Little steps above like 1 through 4 are huge. They are an 8.0 on the Kingdom “Richter Scale.” Steps of service, steps of love, like those above…reverberate for all eternity.

Because as we told the boys yesterday, Jesus was, and is, the expert on life. And when we put His teaching into practice we grow. When we serve, when we are in last place, we are really in first place. When we lay down our life, we have life in abundance.

The last shall be first.

-- Will Dowell and Dean Wilson

Monday, May 10, 2010

Salvation at the Coke Machine

It was an interesting afternoon of prayer and walking Friday afternoon!  Mike Downey and I walked around Willow Pond and Mike's simple idea was to ask God for His eyes...to see what He sees.

We talked with various people before encountering a man named Jerry (pictured above kneeling down) who was intoxicated by a powerful drug of some sort.  He was extremely animated (in sharp contrast to his posture in the above photo).  The things he was saying were very dark and sad. 

Jerry talked and talked.  At times he got angry and I was envisioning him potentially attacking us.   At other times he became really loving.

I prayed under my breath the name of Jesus.   Mike decided to take the authority in the conversation at one point by saying the Name out loud.  "We've found the way," he said, "His name is Jesus." 

After a while, Jerry walked over to the nearby Coke machine and began to aggressively talk with a man named Jose (on the left above).  Jose didn't understand what he was saying (Jose speaks Spanish)...but I think he knew it wasn't good.  And so Mike made his way over to Jose to apologize for our new friend. 

Mike's conversation with Jose ended up being all about Jesus.  Mike proclaimed the Good News, in Spanish, and Jose was eager to hear it.  And for some reason Jerry fell on his knees.   I don't think he understood the Spanish Mike was speaking, but yet he fell to his knees.  If Mike would so much as pause briefly, our friend would look up and say "keep going."  Later the police had to be brought in to help with our friend.

My prayer?  That someday Jerry is set free.  I once heard a friend say "it's not mostly about the harvest as it is about the planting and the watering."  I believe a seed was planted.  And yet, frankly, it is hard work to believe that Jerry could be saved.  (Maybe that is why Jesus said the work "is to believe."  I think it is sometimes pretty hard work!).

Two boys from the Kids Club who witnessed some of our interaction said about Jerry: "He's crazy."  And he sure did act crazy. 

How does God see him?  As His Son.  Paid for.  Precious.  Infinitely valuable. 

I like those eyes.

Oh...and one other detail.  Jose prayed to receive Christ! Right there in front of the Coke Machine. Mike and he exchanged phone numbers and we'll stay in touch with him.  Praise the Lord. 

--Dean Wilson

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Watermark Church Service Day at Willow Pond! Thank you Watermark!

The friends from Watermark Church partnered with Behind Every Door in a work day at Willow Pond today.  It was a huge gift.  Friends painted, swept, dug, cleaned the inside of several units for residents, and picked up trash.  In addition, we were recently able to double the size of the basketball court...and today, one of the service projects was the painting of the newly named "Kids Club Court."  Some of the Kids Club kids requested a cross on the court...so we made one.  At center court! 
 
Thank you again to Watermark for all of your hard work!  What a blessing!  We will leave you with this awesome rap, shared by the "Real Women" of Willow Pond...