Culture of Capernaum - Creativity and Tenacity

Throughout the year, we want to highlight some attributes that we see as being part of our YL Capernaum culture.  This month, we highlight, creativity and tenacity.

I (Christen Morrow Ara) recently was invited to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of Young Life in Peru. What a gift to be with leaders, staff, committee, and students that ranged an era of 50 years of ministry in my second home of Lima, Peru. I was greeted at the entrance of the celebration banquet by high school students serving, much like a Young Life banquet in your hometown. At the door, I met high school students with disabilities there with their mothers. Of course, this was where I wanted to be and there was so much joy in meeting them and hearing their stories. Mothers, through tears expressed to me what it meant that we had sewn the seed of Capernaum into Peruvian soil 14 years ago when their children were infants with brand new diagnoses, and no one had vision for their kids’ social inclusion let along  

spiritual purpose or belonging.

I thought back to the early days of casting the vision for ministry in Peru, navigating culture and disability, the questions, fears, and ‘what ifs?’ that came with a new vision. I thought of the many Peruvians volunteers who became family to me that braved this new territory with me.  I think of those who took up the corner of a mat, sometimes literally, as we carried students who didn’t even own a wheelchair down 3 flights of stairs to the beach so they could experience camp alongside  peers, in tents, finding ways to prop them up at club in the sand, at meals, all to get them in front of Jesus. I thought of the creativity, tenacity, joy, and perseverance of these leaders just to get to where friends were in schools, hidden away in homes because they didn’t have wheelchairs or mobility, in shanty towns, in orphanages. As I stood with these Capernaum friends, their brave mamas, and this team I got to help form, I was humbled deeply. This is what Capernaum is! We don’t wait for a ramp to a roof (or a clubroom on the beach or a shanty town shack), a special camp with a program and schedule set for our friends, a Jesus storybook Bible and cabin time box…. or whatever our friends might need. We make the ramp, the accessibility, set program, design creative ways to help with gospel proclamation all so that our friends can be set in front of Jesus!

So, as I stood and watched our Peruvian friends with disabilities perform alongside their high school peers at all-city club in a cultural dance-off, sat with the mothers at the anniversary celebration, participated in the carnival that followed club, I thought of all of you, Capernaum. You’re still at it… building relational in-roads at schools, in areas, at camps, creating greater access, gently leading our mission with joy and creativity around how we welcome our friends, and making sure that they do not miss Jesus and His great hope! Whether in developing countries like Peru and Tanzania, in rural Arkansas or the bustling city of San Francisco, I hope we keep praying and dreaming for kids with disabilities; for the ones who have not yet been born, for the little ones whose parents are adjusting to a diagnosis and cannot even dream of a their kids experiencing a faith community and meaningful place to belong and grow in their faith, for the teenagers in front of us now…. Lets keep doing it, friends! And let’s be like those 4 men in Mark 2, those leaders in Lima, Peru, those who will go to any length to pave the way and are willing to change culture, build and create along the way. This is what we were made for and the best ministry is yet to be done, keep creating, loving, and leading with joy and gratitude!