A day at the DC

I am currently sitting in the parking lot at HPC Highland. I wanted to take a moment to share my day with you. A few weeks ago we opened our BRDC Coffee House which is a tool we use to reach out to people in the community. When people call our hotline number we often refer them to the café so they can meet with someone who can talk with them, pray with them and offer some counsel. Sometimes we refer them to other agencies, sometimes we can help them in-house; we just try to help everybody get to whatever their next step might be. We can’t solve all their problems but we can point them to the One who can. Today we had 20 people drop in. I was so stoked! We had everybody from toddlers to the elderly…all gathered together drinking coffee and eating snacks. Thank God for the warehouse!

The twenty people at the café was just the beginning…we also had some other guests up in the house. All this week we have five gentlemen helping us with painting and repair work. We love volunteers and we will put anybody to work that even looks our way. (We truly are shameless about that.) The really cool thing about these guys is that when they’re not with us they’re locked up in prison. They’re with us on work release from Department of Correction and they are some of the sweetest, most genuine guys you will ever meet. One of them has less than a month left before he’s released and will be returning to north Baton Rouge; only a few blocks from the Dream Center. He’s done 11 years. Another gentleman is from New Orleans. He told one of our staff, “Some people lost their house in the storm…I lost my whole city. I don’t know where I’m going back to.” He had a wife and two children but that was 17 years ago; before he got locked up. His kids are grown now and his wife is gone. He’ll be out soon too.

I think it’s so fine that God has strategically placed these guys in our midst. They get to be a part of what God is building at the Dream Center. They get to take ownership; to play a part in the miracle. And while they’re fixing holes and painting walls, another group of volunteers is getting the GED room ready to start classes next week. We have partnered with the Literacy Coalition and will be hosting classes Monday-Thursday every week. I think that will be huge in helping some of our friends and neighbors to get to the next level.

So we’ve got toddlers, prisoners, young people, the elderly, volunteers and the good folks from the Winbourne Baptist Church all rolled up into the mix. I don’t know what God is cooking up but it’s gonna be like nothing we’ve ever tasted before. I can’t wait!!!

All glory to Him!