One recently graduated from a bachelor of nursing program and is working in an emergency room at a major hospital. This help started when he was in the 6th grade and continued on a 2 times/week basis, year around, until I could not remember how to do the math any more (somewhere in calculus). He was a struggling 6th grader and would almost certainly have dropped out at some point without help.

We started with the other when she was in the 6th grade also. She would come to the house about 4 PM (4 days each week) and we would work with her continuously (through supper) until homework was done. This took until about 8-9 PM at first but after a few months only required 2 hours or so. By the end of the year her grades were all between 85 and 92–which I think was the upper limit her peer group would tolerate–and she probably only came over two or three days each week. The tutoring continued as needed until she moved away.

The amount of effort necessary to make a real difference in a student who is in serious trouble is huge. However, these efforts were very important to them and to us. There are few things that can make the impact that tutoring (over time) can without requiring a total reorganization of your life (CB and Karen in mind here).

Bennett Willis

As you know, we once again have children in our home who are school age. The schools, especially the middle school and high school, where our kids are zoned to attend have a lot of discipline problems and a high drop out rate. Thankfully, we were able to have our children re-zoned because Carrie required special assistance due to her FAS and other problems. The children are all fortunate this year to be attending a school with high parental involvement and teachers who care about children and correspond with parents before there is a problem.

Last year dealing with the “old” middle school and anticipating high school was a nightmare. Getting information from these schools was like pulling “hen’s teeth.” The newsletters always arrived in the mail after the school events had taken place. The boys were unable to hear the announcements in class because of the level of noise and disruption. The majority of the children zoned to these particular schools come from very dysfunctional homes and a high percentage of the children come from homes were one or more parents are in jail, rehab, or have drug and alcohol problems. One of the saddest things was that the former high school principal had “cleaned up” the school (both literally and figuratively) and had turned it around. The drop out rate had decreased, expulsions and suspensions had decreased and the test scores had increased. I read an article which quoted his philosophy as “providing a clean and safe environment for kids and giving them structure” which apparently worked in this high school so well, that the administration moved him to a new high school that was in worse shape and now the school that he had helped is on a downward spiral and his new school is improving.

We hear Christians all around us stating that the problem is because “God has been taken out of the school” and I am sure that is a contributing factor, but the biggest problem is because God is not in the homes and in a lot of cases neither are one or more of the parents.

CB and I have been fortunate to have been blessed so many times this past year as we have seen God work in the lives of the children who now make their home with us. Structure has been so important to them. Knowing that someone will pick them up at school that they will get to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner, that they will have clean clothes to wear, a clean bed to sleep in and not have to worry about being awaken in the night to fighting or the police coming to the door and most important of all that they are loved and as much as we love them, God loves them more. When we hear the younger ones telling us that Jesus loves them and He is their friend and cares about them it blesses our hearts. When they come up out of the blue say “thank you for washing my clothes,” “Nan, you cook good” or “Pa always takes us to school,” it makes tiredness at the end of the day seem to disappear.

Knowing the back ground of our children, it is so sad to think of all of the other kids living in similar situations who will never know a difference because our churches are not ministering to their families because they are “undesirables.” We have to do something to reach these families. The gentleman from Australia said that “the great-grandparents were part of the church” and went on to show how each generation was getting farther away in their relationship to the church and God. With that in mind, if there is a continuation of that pattern most of our churches will be completely dead and closed, because there will be no ties to the church or to faith in God. It is a sad and scary thought.

Prayerfully, our churches will wake up and step up to the plate to minister to these families before we lose the opportunity to reach this generation.

Part of the issue is that society is changing at a greater pace than ever before. Australian Churches are full of older people looking for certainty and comfort in a world they don’t understand and so the ‘way we do Church’ reflects their desire for days gone by. Yong people look at this and see nothing that attracts them.

The Churches that successfully engage young people have shown a willingness to create structures and services that suit young people. Sure, we need to hang onto the unchanging central message of the gospel, base our church activities on the Bible and Jesus, BUT we can change our ‘style’ and the way we do things to engage our youth without losing our real reason for being.
This is the greatest challenge for Churches, and one that many of the major traditional Churches struggle with.

On the subject of education, the Christian Schooling movement began in Australia about 20 years ago primarily because it was seen that Church linked schools were heading down the same secular path that Government run schools were. To some extent, these new ‘Christian Schools’ in Australia operate with a philosophy very similar to that which the traditional Church linked schools had when they began 80 – 100 years ago.

We live in a culture that tells our young people that ‘self’ is a worthy God. They don’t necessarily believe that because so many young people are searching for something more meaningful – but our culture doesn’t offer an alternative.

Our challenge is to provide our young people with an alternative that is more meaningful, engaging and inspiring while allowing them to develop their relationship with Jesus.

I’m looking forward to this paper!