2010 Reflection

Below is the text from the end of the year newsletter I sent to many others. Thanks for all the support this year!

It’s hard to believe the end of 2010 is coming soon. During this Advent season, I look back at the last year and have seen God’s provision and generosity through your support, prayers, and participation in our events and programs, even as I transitioned into full-time as the catalyst in June.

One word I can use to describe this past year is “favor.” We received a generous capacity grant this year that provided computer equipment, marketing material for our Believe mentoring program, and an urban gardening handbook for our Neighborhood Gardens program. This grant also included wonderful leadership coaching in handling finances, strategic planning, online marketing, and fund development, perfect for someone starting out full time! We also renewed our contract with the County of Public Health to continue giving workshops on having safe and healthy home environments for families.

This favor also extended into some of our initiatives. Our Monterey Park Ministerial Association has completed another year of finding ways we can reach out to our community together. On Good Friday, over 100 people prayerwalked to pray for peace in our city and community. In the summer, a number of churches coordinated their VBS program schedule so they could provide families with 6 weeks of VBS for the community. And our annual Community Thanksgiving Service also provided a candle prayerwalk to City Hall as we put into practice our role as “salt and light” in our communities.

We also facilitated several neighborhood BBQs this year, as a way for us to practically reach out to our literal neighbors. Without fail each time, neighbors say, “we should do this more often!” Even in Los Angeles, people realize they want to know and trust their neighbors even though the default is to live in isolation.

Next year, we are going to capitalize on this year’s favor to use the urban gardening handbook to help our low-income neighbors using local food banks to grow their own food. We hope to expand our mentoring program with Alhambra School district to be more robust and hire someone part-time to lead that development. We are also growing a new Alhambra Ministerial Association of pastors and ministers who will work together on ways to bless the city (we are planning a join prayerwalk at the beginning of Lent next year).

Thanks for all your support this year, and may you have a blessed 2011!

Jesse Chang, Catalyst

High Expectations

I once read a front page article in a magazine about the science of failure. One of the interesting ironies I remembered in the article is that failure often helps people and organizations become better and often have more positive lessons to learn than success does. In fact, success can often blind us to factors that were never in our control in the first place, but we take credit anyway (like a good economy!).

Yesterday's Prayerwalk and Harvest Fest was a successful Kingdom Causes event as any, but we also realized a factor beyond our control was the weather--a strong rain storm went through before our event--and how much that kept people inside, especially our senior neighbors who had said they would come. Quite a few were sick too!

Also, we realized that perhaps we were competing with the Church of the City rather than truly collaborating on this Halloween weekend--so many other "harvest fests" including the church who hosted the site who just had theirs the night before. Why not hold this event embedded within another congregation's event? Or better yet, pool our resources in the ministerial association and do one large event for the community?

Finally, I had high expectations for getting people out from the community who weren't part of our existing network to this event, and there were a few. But the truth of it is that we never really promoted it in the city nor did we really engage community members who would be interested. I felt a bit like we did the typical church outreach event which is attractional: "build it and they will come." But then we don't really allow the community to be at that table to help in that planning process.

"We're still learning," as my co-worker said. Not reaching our high expectations is a great learning opportunity. Extending ourselves some grace in the process helps us not to navel gaze but learn and persevere for the next time!

Neigbhorhood Gardens Reflection: Goals and Reality

I had a chance to talk to someone this week who was interested in doing something with growing food, like what we are doing in our neighborhood gardens. His enthusiasm was apparent even if he didn't know what he was going to do, what his goals were, etc.

But as I recounted our brief journey in our own neighborhood, I realized how similar I felt when this idea of growing food as a vocation came about: so much passion, but a scattered focus.
Perhaps because food is so basic to life, it's the reason there are so many ways of approaching it in the non-profit world:
food banks, food co-ops, childhood obesity, school lunch reform, farmer's markets, community gardens, school gardens, self-sufficiency/empowerment, job training programs to name a few.

I kept repeating the refrain talking to this enthusiastic gardener that you need to have some goal in mind when you start, and then let reality sharpen your focus. This has very much been the lesson learned for us. Neighborhood Gardens started with the idea of growing food that would benefit residents and also low-income residents by donating a portion to our local food bank. But reality was that our few gardens weren't big enough for regular donations. There was no way we could provide a significant amount of food for the food banks.

That's why I hope next week's Harvest Fest on 10/30 will have as one of its outcomes a local network of neighbors and their gardens and fruit trees becoming regular contributors to our food bank while in the midst of forming community around local food. In many ways, the reality of our limitations provided an opportunity for us to look for creative solutions that are far more sustainable and community-oriented than if we strived to do it on our own.

Thank God our goals don't always work out the way we thought they would!

Environmental Justice and Our Cities

Our guest blogger today is Thomas Wong, a resident of Monterey Park and also on the city's Environmental Commission. He shares how "being green" is not just "saving the planet," but also very much a justice issue for our low-income neighbors.

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

Recycle. Turn off the faucet. Turn off the lights when you leave the room. Change out your old light bulbs for CFLs. Carpool. We are reminded of many simple steps we can take to ‘green’ our lives, and even save some money, every single day. However, caring for the environment is about more than just wasting less and saving money. Often, many don’t realize that environmental issues are also social justice issues.

This past July, a number of high-level federal environmental officials came to the San Gabriel Valley to hear residents and community leaders share some of their concerns. Among the many thoughts conveyed, one of the most poignant was expressed by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. In her remarks, she reminded the audience that environmental protection is really, simply, community protection. When we work to make sure our air is clean, our water is safe, and open space is available, we’re working to make sure that the physical environment does not threaten or diminish the quality of life of our communities. Caring for the environment is really about preserving and enhancing the health and welfare of our families, friends and neighbors.

Sadly, the poor and disadvantaged often suffer disproportionately from environmental hazards and degradation. When an area is polluted, it is the poor who lack the ability to relocate and are left with few resources to mitigate the effects. When decisions about land use and development are made, the needs of the poor are overlooked because they lack the ability to organize and communicate effectively. The poor—commonly ethnic minorities—are set at a disadvantage because they are often unaware of environmental risks due to cultural and language barriers, among other reasons, and are often marginalized because of their lack of economic and political influence.

Looking around at the San Gabriel Valley, landfills and industrial areas that are associated with increased pollution levels and health risks are often located in lower class neighborhoods that lack the resources to fight them. A few years ago, USC came out with a study that linked serious long-term health effects with living next to freeways, especially among children. Because of the general complaints about freeways, those who can afford to stay away or move away from them usually do, leaving the poor to bear the brunt of the harm.

When going down streets in neighborhoods of varying socio-economic backgrounds, streetscapes and sidewalk quality are tell-tale signs of the disparities that exist between the haves and have-nots. Compare posh stretches of Colorado Blvd in Pasadena to some of the harsher stretches of Garvey Ave. in El Monte. In largely ethnic communities like those in the San Gabriel Valley, especially with large working-class foreign-born populations, outreach and education on environmental risks and solutions is challenging but essential.

As we seek God’s Kingdom here on earth, we cannot ignore the role we have to play as Christians to call out and work to root out environmental injustice when we see it. Let us go beyond simply greening our habits. As we walk around our neighborhoods, let us pay closer attention to our physical environment and its serious effects on our community. And let us engage with our leaders to call out injustice that exists and advocate for equitable solutions to the environmental threats that our community faces.

ABCD Training Reflection

Sung Kim, our summer intern, wrote this reflection on the training in ABCD (Asset-Based Communty Development) done on 7/20-21 at Chinese Evangelical Free Church in Monterey Park.

It can be widely agreed upon that each individual or community has needs. Each community lacks something. Whether it’s a local park for children to play in, better roads, or safety, it is not difficult for us to identify what is not right about a community.I was privileged to be introduced to Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) a couple of weeks ago in a training led by Terri Larson and Susan Sngiem. It was a great time of learning, fellowship, and listening to stories of the journeys God had brought each individual that was there. The message was simple, yet a complete shift of thinking. Instead of starting from a needs perspective, the goal was to start from what the community already had or was good at. This shift thus allows each person in the community to directly participate in their community in a way that promotes empowerment and a sense of ownership. As I carefully tilted my ears towards Terri and Susan as they spoke, there was only one thing I could think of. “But what about the needs!”

This phrase stuck with me the next couple of hours after the training. I knew there was nothing really wrong about focusing on the needs, but something led me to believe it wasn’t the best way. How do we really know what we need anyway? Perhaps an analogy to prayer can help us unpack this further. When I usually pray about a petition or request to God, I start with my needs. I ask God for things to help me with ministry, school, and finding parking (which God has answered many times by the way!). The ABCD training really challenged my way of thinking. Perhaps ABCD is so compelling because it teaches us to acknowledge what God has already blessed us or the community with. It tells us that God has already given so much and that there is “hidden treasure” waiting to be discovered by those who are willing to search. Having such a perspective may also allow us to realize that our preconceived needs were never really needs in the first place.

The potential for ABCD is tremendous. It provides an avenue for grant money to be used more effectively and directs us to see the good in our communities, to see God in our communities. I was truly blessed by the ABCD trainings. It has changed the way I think about what it means to be lacking and to search for God’s Kingdom wherever I go. If you ever feel like you can’t see the Kingdom of God in your community, you may only have to search next door to find it. Blessings.

On a Mission from God?

Last week I had a telling interaction with one of my co-teachers at Upward Bound Study Center in Monterey Park, where we teach recent immigrant Chinese students ESL and other subjects.

We were talking about something and she said something along the idea that she'll "be on mission" next week. Meaning she was going overseas. I thought about it for a second and said, "Aren't you already on mission?"
She said, "Well, you can take it up with God." I responded, "I don't have a comeback for that."

Notwithstanding my inability to give an adequate comeback, there's something about our in-house Christian language that has "mission" still placed in foreign, extraordinary, special terms. In some ways, it seems to be a positive elevation of this aspect of what it means to be the Church. But in many ways, it creates the kind of hierarchy that makes it only for those spiritually mature and sacrificial enough to be part of this elite circle--and everyone else either a spectator or financial supporter.

Mission flows from the heart of the Triune God. If that is a fundamental part of God's nature, then mission is not something we simply "do" as one thing amongst many in The Church. It is central to her being.

You all are "on a mission from God"!

My Neighborhood Is My Youth Group

I started teaching ESL and being the "youth worker" at Upward Bound Study Center in Monterey Park this week (a program reaching out to low immigrant Chinese high school youth), had a discussion with a local church about their desire to restart their youth group with an emphasis on reaching community kids, and had my recently graduated mentee from our Believe mentoring program randomly stop by Friday night with his friends to chill out while they were running (to exercise).

All my previous times with youth was in a church culture with church kids (I was reminded of this Saturday when I saw my old church's youth go off to their annual camp retreat). But now I'm in a completely different situation where most of these kids aren't believers. And I'm loving this opportunity because I feel like this is the missional edge we are called to as the Church.

I've often said that youth pastors in our cities should view these neighborhood kids as their youth group, instead of just those who go to their church programs. It's a practical way of working out that old idea that the neighborhood your church is in is your parish. A parish mentality begins with the belief that all those located around your church meeting place is of concern, whether or not they attend your church, whether or not they are believers. But typically, a youth worker is hired to take care of the kids who come to church first and then maybe try and attract more kids to go to their group (like the picture implies).

This attractional model of youth ministry ("build something great and they will come") won't die out anytime soon. And I know firsthand that most churches won't sign on to a completely "missional" model if it doesn't benefit the church kids and the youth group program. I also know that many church kids are nominal at best, and that we can't assume they are all followers of Jesus. We all know the tensions and perils of youth ministry.

But if Jesus came to "seek and save the lost," couldn't we write in the job description of each youth pastor or worker something that reflects that same heart Jesus had for the lost? Volunteer at the Boys and Girls club? Mentor an at-risk student? Teach ESL to the low-income immigrant students at Mark Keppel? Let's not leave outreach and mission to some summer trip or camp or think that it's up to the kids in the youth group. Leadership has to.....well, lead the way!