My 'Hair-brained' Christmas Idea

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Dude Armor-All-ed My Windows!

There just aren’t enough jobs for youth in our neighborhood.    As it turns out, there aren’t enough mentoring adults either.

Recently, I employed a youth who had a realistic need and wanted to earn some money.  I obliged because, according to him, he was avoiding dishonest ways of getting the money (See The Wrong Kind of 'Come Up').  My challenge was, I was already committed to being with my sons on that morning.  I would not be able to supervise the work or model what I wanted, side by side.

I asked him to clean and wash my mini van.   I set out the vacuum, the soap, the Armor-all, and the Windex.  I verbalized the directions. I even checked on the progress, once after an enthusiastic reading of The Monster at the End of This Book and again before putting the boys down for naps.

Apparently, my spotty presence and cursory dictation of instructions were not enough.

Minutes before this youth was “done” and set to be paid, I noticed that the van windows looked conspicuously oily, beyond streaky.  

Dude Armor-All-ed my windows!

Deep breath.

“That was his best.” I told myself

“Even though he is 18, nobody has taught him to wash a car” I reasoned.

“But it cost me as much as a professional car wash!” I exclaimed “And I am going to have to do a lot of it over myself!”

Deep breath.

“I should have supervised this better.”   Maybe.  But I was not available to do so.

“I should have done it myself!” I lamented in private.

I ultimately landed on this: “It was still the right thing.  Next time we'll get it better. Learning is going to happen over time and through trusted relationship.”

This one instance illustrates a single truth that I pray more people hear and respond to.  There are too many youth growing up without older folk investing in them.  They need dedicated parents, motivated mentors, talented teachers, and patient employers.   I get upset when I reflect on the reality of so many City Heights youth. Most feel a huge vacuum that should be filled by the consistent presence of caring adults.   It is even more upsetting to see the unexpected symptoms of young people going at life alone.

Greased up windows are one thing.   But self–inflicted pain and increasing despair in the eyes of youth should jolt us all.

Would you consider being significant in one teen’s life? To explore this option with me, click the above image and let me guide you.  It might cost you some extra money and a vehicle’s collection of streak-free car windows.   But the sense of fulfillment you will gain, will help your vision anyhow.

Consider Yourself Wanted, Invited and Needed

Watch Out Chipotle

Watch out Chipotle. UrbanLife just got into the burrito making business.   We are not actually selling burritos.  Nor are we in any place to compete with a corporate burrito dealer.   We are in position to imitate their ingenious burrito assembly line though.   In fact, it seems to benefit us in at least a few ways:

Burritos are hand-held.

On Bible study nights, we are able to hand both Bibles and burritos to students as they walk through the door.   Right away, we are interacting with youth and getting into the scriptures.

Burritos are versatile.

Provided we keep mixing up the ingredients, we may be able to serve burritos every single Bible study night.   On the proposed menu, we’ve got egg and potato, rice, bean and summer squash, pollo asado and corn.  And we are just getting started.   Predictability meets variety.

Burritos empower youth.

Five student leader-interns are earning a stipend each month as they learn and engage in servant leadership.  Serving food that they prepare to their peers creates a sense of ownership that we give up when we order pizza from the local storefront cardboard-tasting pizza shop.

Burritos improve health.

Parents with toddlers know that the most efficient means of getting vegetables into their children’s stomachs is to hide the vegetables.   Tortillas are ‘best in show’ for that purpose.  Because our community is over-represented among those who are obese and overweight, UrbanLife needs to be part of the solution.  

Be on the lookout for salsa recipes, shared by UrbanLife students.   Burritos may just crack your Top-10 routine meals at the house.

Let Smiles Speak

These are the looks of promise

Eager to be developed

These are smiles of contentment

Proud to be chosen 

These are the children of God

Poised to change a neighborhood

These are the leaders of tomorrow

Believing now that we believe in them

This is the Come Up

Let This Marinate

The Wrong Kind of 'Come Up'

My students are “coming up” on things way too frequently.

In the hood, to “come up” on something, means stealing it.  

Before I served youth with UrbanLife, I didn’t think so many people were engaged in criminal activity just to meet basic needs. But these days, I see it happening all around me.  The tentacles of poverty have their slime all over our students.  And this morning, it’s grieving my soul.

*******

Corey didn’t commit the crime.   But he was a lookout for the criminals.  Corey needed money from somewhere.  And it wasn’t coming from his mom.  According to him, she gets the most angry when he asks for new clothes.   He shouldn’t have to wear shoes that are so small, his big toe loses feeling.  But those are the shoes he wears every day.

We told Henry that he was going to steal from the wrong person at some point.   But the immediate rush of dopamine and monetary reward was too great for him to stay away from.  He kept stealing.  Finally, last spring, he was arrested in a stolen vehicle.  It landed him behind bars for some hard time.  

Walter is perhaps the most promising student I have worked with at UrbanLife.   He excels in both school and sports.   Adults are compliment him and students follow him.   I just happen to follow him on Facebook.  Over social media I began to see phones for sale way too often.  If he wasn’t stealing them himself, Walter was selling the stolen phones for profit. 

Todd made sure he slept at his friend’s house last weekend.  It was the end of the month.  And there wasn’t any food in his cupboards.  His dad is on trial for burglary next week.   He desperately wants a different life for himself though.  On Sunday, he interviewed to be a part of The Come Up Leadership Development Internship.  We are all pulling for this kid.

********

There’s no excuse for this kind of behavior.  But it’s also not a given that these guys can ask their parents for a lock (for your PE locker), for new socks or football cleats, or for money to pay a debt for a textbook that his sister wrote in.  Most of my guys are not even thinking about homecoming.   The way into a suit and onto a picture order is way out of reach.  Cash is dry at home. Jobs are hard to come by.  And foot-pushing scooters are their best mode transportation.

I've taken some hacks at addressing this blunder. I’ve hired youth to work at our house.  For hours at a time, they’ve mowed the lawn, pulled weeds, and washed vehicles.  Last week I had a couple youth washing exterior windows for neighbors.  But these are all '1-offs'.

This week’s launch of THE COME UP, our leadership development internship, will create new realities for a handful (See yesterdays post).     “Coming up” doesn’t have to mean stealing.   It can also mean rising from the bottom to high places.   We believe this will happen in the lives of many of our young people.   This kind of “Come Up” is an avenue to meaningful work, fair pay, and real challenge that calls forth their gifts.   Perhaps most importantly, participation in this internship decreases the chances of their lives being defined by the worst thing they haveever done.

You can allow 1 more student to be included in this internship.   Commitments of $100 a month allow us to expand the opportunity to additional qualified applicants.

Give HERE if you are able, designating gifts to “The Come Up.”

*Names are altered to protect identities of my students.  Photos included in this entry are not the actual students I am describing.

The 'Come Up'

Transformed PEOPLE transform neighborhoods.

This is our core belief. 

New buildings won’t produce lasting change around here.   A stronger police presence alone won’t all together eliminate the crime.   Parenting classes by themselves can’t retool families that are stacked densely into apartments.  Even doubling the amount of UrbanLife activities to the calendar won’t remake the realities for some of my neighborhood friends. 

God still holds the patent on life transformation.   Only He can generate the kind of transformation we are longing for around here.

That’s why we are committed to leadership development of youth.  Christian leadership development necessarily involves God in the transformation of people.

We believe transformed youth will grow up to be different kinds of moms and dads, employees and neighbors.  Better ones.  It took only 12 people (disciples- see New Testament), relentlessly committed to following Christ, to change the course of history. So I am pretty sure our neighborhood will look different with a band of transformed youth, driven to love God and neighbor.

Yesterday we interviewed 15 youth for “The Come Up,” a year-long leadership development internship.   In this internship, we look critically at the challenges facing our neighborhood and push the interns to engage in positive ways.  We coach them to be Jesus-style leaders, serving rather than wielding power.   And we pay them $100 monthly stipends.   This allows us to prepare them for employment and to train them to be professional and productive.  Additionally it allows a portion of them to help their families and turn from dishonest methods of making money in the ‘hood.  Unfortunately, we are seeing startling numbers of youth turn to different versions of a ‘hustle’ in efforts to meet basic needs (see tomorrow’s post for more).

Help me develop more students.  Although 10 of the 15 students, who interviewed, are ready for this kind of rigor and development, our current budget allows for only 5 hires.  While we have capacity to train more students, we just don’t have the capital.  With only a few new financial partners, we will be able to hire more emerging leaders this Thursday. More specifically, one new partner giving $100 a month will allow us to include an additional student in the cohort.  Four financial partners, giving $25 dollars a month will also allow us to include an additional student in the cohort.  

Would you pray and consider giving generously to see youth in our city, ‘Come Up?’

LINK to give online.

LINK to UrbanLife homepage