building up bridges

I left Friday after work for a ministry trip with BSSM. We were going to minister to young boys on drugs. As you may recall, I have a messed up sphere for "minister", no sphere for "boys" and have now taken 3 drug tests in the past 5 months and passed them all. But I signed up with anticipation, just knowing this was something I didn't want to miss. "The Bridge" is an adolescent drug treatment facility in Alabama. They operate 14 different facilities throughout the State. This particular facility was for boys ages 13-17, most have been court appointed to the program and some have psychological disorders, as well as substance abuse problems. I arrived Friday night to a cafeteria of boys in khaki pants and big tennis shoes. Dressed in cheap, collared shirts in various colors, tattooed, greasy and abrupt. I instantly asked God, “what do you see”? He said, “The cream of the crop, the very best, a Harvard graduating class”. Not quite what I saw.

That evening our ministry team, divided into teams of two, sat in front of the boys individually, and told them how God saw them. We learned their stories, their backgrounds, their family life. Over and over, we heard stories of neglect and abuse. One boy with a splotchy weak beard and wide brown eyes just stared at me and listened to every word I said. He listened so intently. I had visions of him as a young boy watching his mother, telling her he loved her, that she was beautiful and being her biggest fan. I could tell he was innately an encourager, a teacher’s pet, that adorable little boy, any mother would want to follow her around all day. But his mother needed more than the devotion of a needy kid, found love in “all the wrong places”, and a few years with an abusive step-father, opens the door to escape, wrong friends, cheap highs, police, courtrooms and rehab. He says his real dad is a musician and he wants to be one too, but he’s “not any good”. Story after story, they are all basically the same, “my grandma raised me and my brother, but she died”. “I don’t got no daddy. So I gotta take care of my mama and my two sisters”. He’s 14 and dreams of “working hard” and playing football. “My Granny goes to church sometimes and I go with her. But it’s boring”. Yep, I bet. What can I bring these boys that changes everything? Hope. So I close by eyes and go for it. We call it “pulling out the gold” in people. I show them their value, how God sees them, their potential, their abilities, the little things I see just by looking into their eyes, their desire to simply be loved, their wit and humor, their ingenuity, their kindness, their creativity. All created in God’s image and He is altogether lovely. Their faces change and I see hope in their eyes. We start to ask them about their dreams and they are all glorious amazing dreams. One guy wants to be a heart surgeon. His father and grandfather are surgeons too and he has the SAT scores to get him in medical school. All the other boys listen to him, he is wise beyond his years, a Renaissance boy who you can tell knows a little bit about just about everything. But he’s there- in a plastic chair, and a purple shirt, which tells me he gets out in two weeks. I am a total stranger, I know nothing about him, but all I can think is, “what are YOU doing HERE”? So I tell about my life, my encounters and my complete lack of will power to not do most all things and about a real Savior, who comes along beside me every single day and loves me to pieces and how my heart changes daily as I fall in love and then pleasing Him just gets easy. He hugs me and says, “thank you for coming here”. I meet a boy with light green eyes and white blonde hair. He’s been there 9 days. He has a thick Southern accent. He has 50 more days to go. He hears we are bringing another team in April. He asks me if I am coming too. When I say I had something else to do that weekend, he said, “Like what?” Ugh! “A girls weekend?” It tugged at my heart. What? What could be more important? Ugh! Right then and there I fell in love with greasy boys with bad skin and self-inflicted tattoos. He asked me if I wanted to go shoot hoops and we did. They all called me “ma’am” and I didn’t complain in the least.


We took a group down to a little river behind the property and baptized them, while other boys came to watch. Scott gave his testimony of how he was in a life no different than theirs and you could hear a pin drop. Boys got saved, transformed, loved on. Dreams got awakened, encouraged, breathed upon.


The Bridge boys are rough at first glance, but when you look a little deeper, they shine so incredibly bright they transform you with their beauty.

Photo Courtesy of Angelique Charnock