CQ

One of Westside’s three core values is “family,” or community.  Why?  Why would an educational institution place such a high value on community?  Some might argue that this is a distraction from a school’s main purpose of educating students, but I believe it is critical to the educational process.  

When students are in an environment where they feel connected, known, wanted, and challenged, they are more motivated to learn. When teachers are in an environment where they are supported, growing, and have the time and opportunity to connect informally with students, parents, and each other, they are more passionate about teaching. Our purpose in seeking to develop a healthy community is to further our mission to educate the whole person.

In his book Seeds for the Future, Robert Dale identifies three elements which, when developed, encourage healthy community. I have found that these elements have been confirmed by scripture as well as my own experience. These elements are overlapping and are clearly dependent on one another in order to function properly. Over the next few months I intend to take a deeper look at each of these elements of a healthy community.

Element 1 – Centering – The depth of community
A purposeful community of depth must seek Christ as its source of strength. It must be intentional about taking time to care for the soul and discern God’s direction. 

Over the past year I have developed a deep friendship with a man who truly lives a life with Christ at the center. He spends two hours a day in prayer and reading God’s word. He says that he is captivated by Christ. This man is truly humble and sacrificial, which is so attractive and counter cultural. His response to spending time with Jesus is a passion to take on Christ’s mission to love others, glorify God and further His kingdom.  He could not be as effective in loving and caring for others if he did not spend so much time with Jesus – growing in the Spirit and discerning God’s will. 

Element 2 – Connecting – The width of community
Recently, while in flight from Los Angeles to Portland, I spent time journaling and seeking God, asking Him to reveal areas of weakness in my life. This is not a pleasant prayer, but I have found that with an honest confession of brokenness comes the opportunity for growth. It became clear to me that I needed to be more intentional about connecting with people.

My personality does not lend itself quickly to small talk, but I enjoy talking about things I consider meaningful. It is not that small talk is bad; I am just bad at it. When I got home I told Marta that I felt I needed to be more intentional in making connections with people. We both agreed that we want our home to be a safe and comfortable place; we want to open our home and ourselves to others. Marta and I want to befriend and love others as Christ does. This requires face time and a willingness to open up one’s heart to others. God is beginning to answer this prayer. Over the summer we have had a steady stream of connecting with students, parents, and staff from WCHS, and others from within our community. It has been a rich summer of connecting.

In the same way we need to provide intentional opportunities for connecting within the school community. This is required to expand the width of community at Westside.

Element 3 – Challenging – The height of community
The last element of an extraordinary community is to have a purposeful vision and the courage to live it out. This includes the development of a personal vision and sense of purpose within God’s kingdom, but also a community-wide vision.  We have often talked about excellence as one of our core values. We already promote an environment that seeks continuous growth and improvement.  What we need to add is a prayerfully planned, all encompassing vision and a detailed plan to realize it. This vision is just fluff unless we have the courage to follow Christ toward the execution of His vision for our community and for ourselves.

Over the past few months our school leadership and staff have begun the development of a vision that will lead us toward a specific strategic plan over the next three years.  This vision describes conceptually how our community would function and support the educational process, how teaching and learning in the classroom and through extracurricular experiences would progress toward more completely fulfilling our mission, how our community would prepare and challenge our students to become people of influence for Christ, and how our school is uniquely positioned to serve the Christian community.

If you were not able to attend our community meeting on the 22nd please consider joining us on September 11th to give your input into this visioning process. We are excited about what God is doing within our school and need your help to take it to the next step.

As we all know, life is lived in community in one form or another. To be able to navigate and contribute to the growth of a healthy community is a powerful learning objective in itself. We have the opportunity to model healthy Christian community to the next generation, which could inspire our students to develop communities of extraordinary purpose and influence throughout their lives. I look forward to the coming year as we connect, ground our souls in Christ, and challenge each other to seek a life of vision and the courage to live it out.    

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Tuesday night our Thailand team invited all of our supporters in prayer, finances, and encouragement to attend a dessert in their honor. The night was inspired. It was a true community effort that communicated the spirit of the trip, and the vision of what God is doing through this journey. We had over a hundred people show up and you could tell they understood the beauty of this trip. They were moved to tears. One lady came up to me and said, “This was not a presentation, but a worship service.” Praise God!

Then on Thursday night Marta and I met with three couples from our church. We told stories and shared video and it was such a blessing to me. They wanted to hear! At the end of our evening they prayed for us. I think this was a timely prayer.  It was very encouraging to me, but also I could sense the Holy Spirit working. God is on the move. It is such a thrilling adventure to follow Christ (not always easy).

We still have stories to tell! If you have ears to hear?

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In March of 2005 we began a conversation about transforming the hearts of our WCHS students. Our hope was that we would all begin to have hearts that break for the things that break Christ’s heart.

The result was a trip that turned into a journey… it is ongoing.

We have returned from the trip, but our hearts still ache for our new family in Thailand.

You see, we have fallen in love with the children and staff of Grace Ministries. These are children of extreme poverty, some are orphans, and all were at risk of exploitation. These children are inspiring. They are passionate to become leaders within their country and to change the future for other children.

What happened is they changed us. We came with a lifestyle distracted by entertainment and over indulgence (we still struggle here), now we see Christ much clearer and desire to be captivated by Him. We don’t want to be ordinary, we want to be extraordinary.

While on the trip a vision emerged. We could see very clearly that out of our admiration and love for one another we could develop a partnership that would be mutually beneficial. We would love them like brothers and sisters and tell their story to anyone who would listen. The result of our story telling has been that people feel compelled to respond. Children are getting sponsored and new buildings are being built. More children are being saved.

Grace Ministries is becoming a hub for this kind of work. They will train others to start similar types of work and more children will be saved and groomed into leadership. We will keep telling the story and churches and organizations will be compelled to support these new works.

We also benefit from this relationship. We get to go back and live with them each summer. We get to love them and be loved. We get to learn to put ourselves last.

Join the conversation – Let us tell you our stories – Fall in love

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