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March 2004 Update |
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This update is adapted from the introduction to our recently published 2003 Annual Report. If you would like a copy of the full report and are not sure if you are on our mailing list, please send us your mailing address! ______________________________________________________ One month ago, the big day finally came. Our four oldest boys packed up four years’ worth of belongings that they had collected at the Micah House and moved into the shining new Leadership house. We celebrated this big event in the lives of Cristino, Marvin, David and Jarvin with a beautiful and touching inaugural service, in the company of friends from both Honduras and the United States. The inauguration was a day full of encouraging words, warm hugs and congratulations. It was a perfect day to send these courageous boys into the next stage of their lives! How can I describe the transition that is happening in our boys lives and in the Micah Project? I imagine us standing on a bridge overlooking two distant shores. Looking back to the shore that we have so recently left behind, I see our beginning point on the receding horizon, when God first laid before us a challenge to take His children off the streets and to disciple them towards leadership in His Kingdom. I see the anxious looks of the first eight boys as they moved into our new house, bought on faith, in January 2000. And I see indescribable change in those eyes in the last four years as they began lose the deadened look that belied their tragic pasts and came alive with confidence, compassion and hope. We are not crossing this bridge because we feel that the Micah Project is ready for a change. Rather, it is our boys that have accepted the challenge of leadership and have begun this transformation. Their nascent ideas about how God can use them in the future are quickly forming into full-fledged visions and goals. Thus, we are crossing this bridge to keep up with the boys—to be able to guide them in their first steps into their future. In fact, in our strategic plan; we were not to step onto this bridge until 2005…our boys grew faster than we thought they would! We officially began this transition in July 2003 when we purchased a dilapidated but lovely home for this next step, which we have named the Leadership house. This will be the place where they shake off the last vestiges of childhood and take on the responsibilities of Christian manhood. Here, our older boys will learn things as mundane as how to set a monthly budget, how to shop and cook for themselves, and how to make wise decisions with their time. But they will also learn profound things, such as what it takes to be a leader when the confidence of those around them begins to fail, how to keep trusting the Lord when the water get choppy, and how to make hard decisions in life while always keeping God’s kingdom in their sight. Yes, this is a time of great change for the Micah Project and the young men who are moving into the Leadership house. While this bridge may take us to new places in our ministry, however, it is under-girded by the same principles upon which we founded this project in 2000. And the most important of those underlying principles has increasingly become embodied by a single idea: that of the “incarnational family.” In raising children that are not one’s own, there is a dichotomy: at one end, there are “institutions”—the programs that treat children as numbers and house them in large and impersonal facilities. These children often get a warm bed, a hot meal, and a decent education, but they do not always receive the individual love from a caring and godly parental figure. And that love is the only way that these children will truly overcome the neglect of their past. The other end of the dichotomy, then, is the family. God created the family as the ideal place to raise children. Of course, all of our families are broken by sin, but at the same time, the family is the best place for forgiveness and redemption to take place. It is our awesome and daunting duty to re-create a family situation at the Micah Project as closely as we possibly can. It must be “incarnational” because, in recreating it, we must try to live Jesus Christ in front of the boys. And, when we inevitably fail in our weak and human attempts to be “imitators of God” in front of the boys, we are still incarnational, in modeling the forgiveness and redemption that our Savior’s own incarnation won for us. As we forgive the boys for their failures and we ask them to forgive us for ours, we always remember that it was He who first forgave us. The ideal of “incarnational family” made planning the Leadership house an obvious goal. For, what family cuts off all support for their sons or daughters once they turn eighteen? That is, sadly, what most institutions do with their orphans. But, where would our boys go if they were suddenly alone in the world at eighteen? How would they achieve their goals of future leadership if they have to work instead of going to school? (In Honduras, it’s usually an either/or situation…there are not enough jobs to go around to have the luxury of part-time work.) Since we are the boys’ spiritual family, we must continue to support them until they can successfully stand on their own two feet. That is why we are walking across this bridge with them. That is why we have built the Leadership House. Now that the house is purchased and almost remodeled, we must look to the horizon that is ahead. What is in the future for these boys? In the near future, in November 2004, to be exact, five of our oldest boys will graduate from high school. Our next goal then, is to help them find the best higher education possible according to each of their talents and interests. The boys are already beginning to research colleges and universities! A few weeks ago, a group of college students came to the Micah house to learn about our ministry. When talking to them, Cristino, one of the Leadership house young men, said, “I used to think the future was some far away place, but now I know that it is very near.” In a country where most people work just to put food on the table, and where thinking about the future is a luxury, that statement is a profound one. And it is my prayer that Cristino and the other boys would know that, as long as God gives us the strength to continue, the Micah Project will walk beside them every step of the way as they cross the bridge into their ever-nearing future. Thank you for holding these boys’ hands as well, through your prayers and support, as they take these first courageous steps of manhood! Sincerely, Michael Miller Please take a look at the pictures of the Leadership house on our website: www.micahcentral.org
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