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Topic: End (02/13/06)
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TITLE: With The End In Mind | Previous Challenge Entry
By Patrick Verbeten
02/20/06 -
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Author Stephen Covey states in his book “The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People” that one habit successful people cultivate is to begin with the end in mind. Small dreams produce small successes - giant dreams produce giant results. Fundraiser Dan Hunter suggests that in the initial stages of dreaming and vision casting, we should, “dream like you have all the money, time and people you need” to complete whatever task God has called you to. Be able to put into words what your vision will look like in the end. He adds that it is easier to scale down your plan at a future date than to expand it.
Pastor Tommy Barnett had a burden to start a church in inner city Los Angeles. He read the scriptures to minister to widows and orphans and wanted to heed the call. But he had a problem. Pastor Tommy had a church and congregation in Phoenix, Arizona that needed him. He could not be in two places at once, or could he? By sending his son Matt to work in LA, he was able to begin the vision. It was no easy task. Pastor Matt’s first ministry opportunity was to hold a gunshot victim who lay in the street in front of an old abandoned hospital that would become his church. After that he felt compelled to go to the slain teen’s family. The result was the eventual salvation of three of his fellow gang members and his family. Additionally, it gave Pastor Matt standing in the community. From that ember of faith, the Dream Center was born. It now houses over 200 ministries including drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs, transitional living quarters, food distribution and medical ministries, a run-a-way teen ministry and more. With God’s grace, Pastor Tommy is poised to complete the fourteen million dollar renovation of that hospital that was just an abandoned building when they arrived in the “hood” almost forty years ago.
On the other side of the country, Jim and Carol Cymbala were called to service in a different fashion. Even though he was not trained as a pastor, young Jim and his wife Carol felt compelled to start a church in Brooklyn, New York. Because of their obedience, Brooklyn Tabernacle was born. Though Carol had no music training, she became choir director of the now world famous Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir. Through faith their church and ministry grew. As they prepared to move their church to a larger facility, God added a new vision to their work - The Learning Center. The Cymbalas and their ministry partners saw how a lack of education, GED, English as a Second Language, and even basic reading skills kept residents of their community in poverty. In faith they are pressing on to fill that need by purchasing and renovating an old office building near their new church. What they have found is that not only has The Learning Center helped with education, but also with the bitterness and hopelessness that is so pervasive when clients enter the program. Additionally, many young men and women who were once students at the center are now volunteers who meet others’ needs.
And in the center of the country, Barb Richardson has a dream to create Family Ministries at her church, Praise Assembly in Springfield, Missouri. Though her dream is in its infancy, she too has the faith to move heaven and earth, once again proving that all things are possible with God. Will her vision grow to the extent that Pastor Barnett’s or Pastor Cymbala’s have? Time will tell, but it has all the ingredients: a God-sized vision, a team motivated by faith, even forty years, if necessary, to let her vision become a reality, and she‘s beginning with the end in mind.
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