Love Fort Wayne Podcast
The Love Fort Wayne podcast amplifies the stories of everyday people who are loving and leading in Northeast Indiana to spark imagination, root inspiration, and ignite transformation.
Love Fort Wayne Podcast
Rooted Here: Loving Your Neighborhood & Community into Wholeness with Javier Mondragon
Welcome to Season 5 of the Love Fort Wayne Podcast. The Love Fort Wayne Podcast amplifies the stories of everyday people who are loving and leading in Northeast Indiana to spark imagination, root inspiration and ignite transformation in our community and beyond. At Love Fort Wayne, we believe the pillars of a flourishing city are its leaders, pastors, schools, families and prayer community, and in season five, we're excited to learn from and be encouraged by people who not only lead but love our city in these areas each day. Before we dive in, we want to say thank you for tuning in and we also want to extend a thank you to our partners at Remedy Live for making today's podcast possible. Welcome everybody to the March episode of the Love Fort Wayne podcast. As we've been sharing with you over the first couple of months, we are in season five of the podcast and we're excited that you've joined us either for the first season here this is maybe your first time tuning in or we've got a lot of folks again that have been with us over these five seasons, so thank you for supporting us.
Speaker 1:I am Jeff King and I'm, as always, I'm with my friend Mitch Cruz. Hi, jeff, good to be with you again. My brother, you too, I'm excited about today's guest. Yeah, our guest today is our friend and brother Javier Mondragon of Bridge of Grace Compassionate Ministries. Javier, how are you? I'm good.
Speaker 2:I'm glad to be here. Yeah, glad to have you. Thank you for the invitation no-transcript.
Speaker 1:to start off just by asking you to explain a little bit more about Bridge of Grace. We've got a lot of folks that know who you guys are and who you are, but some folks listening that don't. So can you share a little bit about Bridge of Grace and then how that ties into your passion for Southeast Fort Wayne?
Speaker 2:Sure, sure. So my wife and I moved here back in 2007 to this city of Fort Wayne. We moved into this neighborhood called Mount Vernon Park, and so we've been there since Our kids were born. Here in Indiana we have four, and Bridge of Grace started in 2012. So we were doing church. We had a church called Grace At that time it was called Grace Point South and then out of the church, we were doing some programming for the community. We had an after-school program, we had a cleanup kind of picking up trash and clean up the neighborhood program.
Speaker 2:And just by living in the neighborhood, in the community, I just saw a lot of challenges, right, the challenges that people are experiencing in Southeast Fort Wayne, and I wanted to do more. I had a lot of desires, I had a lot of dreams to do more, and I just didn't know how, because we were limited in resources, limited in funding. And so there was a gentleman in my congregation His name was Zees, and I remember one day, I think, he came into my office and asked me for my vision what's your vision? I said, well, I have a lot of vision, I have a lot of dreams and I wanted to do more, and so I told him my problem is we have limited resources, we have no funding and no people.
Speaker 2:And he said well, what do you think about a non-for-profit? And I said, what's a non-for-profit? And so I always tell people that I went and read the book Non-Profit for Dummies. And then, after learning, I said, yeah, this is what we should do. So in 2012, we established Bridge of Grace Ministries and, yeah, the idea was to kind of continue to do the programs that we were doing, but embrace the neighborhood and the community. In Southeast, education is always at the top, so our vision is to break the cycle of poverty and we know that education is key for that.
Speaker 2:That's kind of the story on how everything began. Such a neat story.
Speaker 3:It is Javier. Can you give a little bit more of your background, where you grew up and how you ended up becoming a pastor?
Speaker 2:in my community, my neighborhood, was the gangs. We had a lot of gangs, a lot of drugs, and so at the age of 12, I turned to the gangs. I got to embrace me and my oldest brother was one of those that was the leader of the gang and he was in and out of prison all the time. And so, yeah, from 12 to 17 was a kind of rough, rough time. Didn't grow up in church at all, but at the age of 17, I had a brother who became a Christian in Mexico, moved to the United States, and so at 17, my mom passed. She died.
Speaker 2:So he came to the funeral and pulled me aside and he said hey, you need to stop doing what you're doing. You're going to end up in prison, you'll kill someone, somebody will kill you. And that was true. You're going to end up in prison, you'll kill someone, somebody will kill you. And that was true. And I said well, I've tried to change, I have tried many times to stop doing what I'm doing, but I just can't. I think it's the environment. And so he said well, do you want to come with me? And I said yes, and so this is back in 1997.
Speaker 2:I was 17 years old, I came to the United States and the state of Arkansas, of all places, and that's where, yeah, two weeks after, the Lord kind of changed me and yeah so since then, at the age of 17,.
Speaker 2:At the age of 18 is when I fell call into ministry and so, amazing, god is how he is right, he calls you and you don't know where he's going to call you to. But when we move into this neighborhood, I realized that a lot of the challenges and what our youth and our kids are experiencing in that is the same way. Right, there was a lot of crime, a lot of drug houses, a lot of pressure from gangs to our kids, a lot of single moms, which that's another thing that you know. At some point this is years ago I remember seeing the statistic that it was like 60% of the zip code where we are. We're single household, single woman, single mom, and so I kind of relate to that too. I remember my mother and the struggles that she had, and so I kind of relate to that as well.
Speaker 1:Man you know, mitch Javier knows this story. Obviously. We shared it when my wife and I moved back to Fort Wayne I'm from here and she's from Northern Indiana, more Northern than us we moved back here for a while. We didn't go back to the church that I grew up in, but eventually we did. It felt comfortable for her and at the time my teenage daughters were babies and we went back to the church and that was my first connection to Javier and the church and Bridge of Grace and just being able. Right at the very beginning, our senior pastor at that time had befriended Javier and we were all in with prayer, walking and going through the neighborhood, and I share with him that Mount Vernon Park is the neighborhood that my grandmother lived in for 45 years, that's right.
Speaker 1:And so she's. I mean it's just been within the past 10 years that we've placed her in some different places because of her age. She's still thriving, but 45 years and I mean I can remember being a little boy growing up there, staying there, walking through the neighborhood there and sharing with her as we were coming back to Fort Wayne, like there's something happening in your neighborhood. You know the church is involved with something happening in your neighborhood, so it's, I mean it's. It's always cool when you see someone with vision in a place that God's given them, in a place that's so dear to you but so dear to so many people.
Speaker 2:So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, God is good. And those prayer walks that you talk about I have no doubt I always talk about that story of our partnership with Fellowship Missionary Church at that time was key, I believe, because the problems are not just the physical problems and what people are experiencing, there's also these spiritual problems and battles. That I feel like that was key. I think the prayer walks, the different churches, not just fellowship, other churches who have come and done some prayer in our community, I think has been making a big difference.
Speaker 3:So was your nonprofit that you created after you read the book. Is that the catalyst for the outreach of your ministry?
Speaker 2:It is. So we always felt like it came out of the church, so there was kind of the arms and the feet of Jesus right to the communities. The action part of you know. This is who we are and this is why we do what we do. We are a community development organization. That's what we call it, but it's always been the spiritual aspect that's been centered to this right.
Speaker 2:It's out of Christ's calling to move the church out of the four walls, and the same out of my experience growing up too. There was a lot of churches in my neighborhood, but our neighborhood was very run down, a lot of crime and everything was permissible, and I don't remember the churches approaching me, approaching our community or doing anything really for the neighborhood. It was all about going to church on Sunday or stay there and then get out and then go home, and so I remember thinking that way. I said, well, why didn't they do anything? And so my ministries. I always thought it would be about reaching out to the people in our community and so, yes, that's been the case.
Speaker 3:What are some of those outreaches that you do? Yeah well, that's a lot.
Speaker 2:But we started, like I said, with this cleanup just because I saw our community run down a lot of crime and so long story. But I read a book called the Tipping Point, malcolm Gladwell. He talks about the broken windows theory, that when somebody breaks a window and nobody fixes it, there's a good chance somebody it. That is really if you clean up and you maintain, crime goes down. It's scientifically proven. And so we started with that. And then the after-school programs. Today we have a business, we have a landscaping business, we are doing housing renovations, we are building new homes, we have an early learning center that we just opened not too long ago. There's a clinic that we partnered with. It's called Alliance Health. And so, yeah, I mean economic development, we're doing housing, we're doing all of these things that are necessary, right to bring this neighborhood back to thrive and to flourish and what God called it to be.
Speaker 3:That's incredible. Yeah, to do all of that. Yeah, yeah, he's like the mayor, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, there's a lot of the staff would do it. I just have the vision, that's right, yeah, so good.
Speaker 1:You know, I think about, um, restorative ministries, javier, especially, uh, restorative ministries, javier, especially restorative neighborhood ministries, and leading a nonprofit that is focused on that. Really, it has its unique challenges. What are some unique challenges as you think about restorative ministry within neighborhoods? And then even, what are some leadership and faith principles that you've had? To root yourself in as you lead.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Yeah, I think one of the biggest challenges that you can experience immediately, I think, when you're working in the under-resourced, under-served communities, is discouragement. It's very easy, it will be very easy to become very discouraged because it takes a long time to create change. It takes a long. There can have some pushback, right. Yeah, I mean you try to do something and then you may have pushback from the neighborhood or businesses or people even people who are doing illegal stuff, right that don't want any change because they know that if it changes then they can be pushed out. So discouragement, I think, is one of the things that we have to go through, and I was just thinking about it. It's like when you start a nonprofit any nonprofit, not just in our location, but it's like the business entrepreneur right that sometimes there's a lot of challenges that you're going to experience. There will be doors that will close to you, but you have to realize that if you are really going to do it, you're passionate about what you're doing. You got to look for another door. It's like you're not going to take no for an answer. You're really going to push through, especially if you call, especially when you have a passion for it and you know that it's God's call and not just what you want to do.
Speaker 2:And the other thing, too, that took a long time for us was trust, to build trust in the community. People don't today, of course, you know, are different, things are different. But it took us seven years. It really took for the church. I didn't understand first why, like the people in our community were not coming. We were trying to reach out to them and ask them to come to, like a block party, or come to the cleanups, be part of it, help us, and they would not come. You know it was really hard. They didn't want to talk to us and well, it takes time for them to trust you. There's a lot of story history on the churches around that a lot of times they just don't care about the community. That's the way people see it, and so you have to be able to trust that you're really being authentic and you're being genuine with what you want to do. So those kind of principles.
Speaker 3:A pastor in our community who planted 13 churches and I think it's like. I think it's John 12, 24, when a seed falls to the ground, you know, and dies, it brings life. I think it's John 12, 24,.
Speaker 2:When a seed falls to the ground and dies. It brings life.
Speaker 3:I think his church actually ended up closing because he planted the other 13,. But that was his. He always sent his best.
Speaker 2:Really amazing.
Speaker 3:But he told me that one time that you have to earn the right to be heard. You have to be there in relationship in order to have that trust be built. I've never forgotten that. Yeah, you have to be there in relationship in order to have that trust be built. I've never forgotten that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you have to build a trust and then also you have to listen to the community as well. So there is a philosophy that we adopted, which is the asset-based community development, and that's based on really listening to the community and making sure that they are, you know, for a long time. And then there's a resource community. There's different things, right. One is hopelessness. It has created a lot of hopelessness because a lot of the they have felt that the business community, right All this investment where there were jobs before, where there were corridors of businesses that left, basically, so they feel like they've been abandoned, right. And then the city also, you know, they feel like the city is paying more attention to other areas of the city, and so there's all this trust.
Speaker 2:That is really hard for people to trust, but they have. There's a reason why, right, there is not just because I don't want to trust you. They have seen all this, this investment. They have seen all these people, the city's, here just to tell me what to fix in my house. It's a city code enforcement that is trying to get at me. So that's kind of the mentality, and so it's really hard to build trust in that. They want to know that you really care and that you're really there for them, and one of those is by really getting them to be part of the solutions, and so that's key to get them to listen to them as well. Yeah, so important.
Speaker 1:That's so good. I know we'll talk a little bit about ways that people can do that in a little bit, wherever they live, but I mean I want to stay there for a second because it's I think you and I know, and you know, mitch, it's easy to look at the needs and or assume the needs or look at the needs and just really even ask people what do you need, what do you need, what? Even ask people what do you need, what do you need, what do you want for us to do for you? And what you're sharing with us is there's so much value that people have, there's so many great assets that people have that we might not see as assets or we don't know because we don't care to actually listen to them.
Speaker 1:And so many people in I call it the there's kind of like a Southeast central corridor of neighborhoods that lead to the next question, where, you know, from Mount Vernon park to Pettit Rudasul, which is just North of there, to Oxford, which is just North of there, there's these, these neighborhoods that have been here for a long time.
Speaker 1:There are three of the largest neighborhoods in the city and there are people with tremendous asset and vision for what they desire for themselves and for their families and for their neighborhoods and you would probably know better than us, javier, they could move. They don't want to. This is their neighborhood. Yes, and so to see them not as a burden or people of great need, but people that have needs but they also have assets, absolutely, it's a powerful thing that you guys have really adopted. So you know, just thank you for your example in that. So you talked a little bit about thriving neighborhoods, asset-based communities. What are some breakthroughs that you've seen? You talked a little bit about what you guys have done with Bridge of Grace, but as you think about Southeast Fort Wayne and this duplicatable model that is at your very heart for Southeast Fort Wayne, what are some breakthroughs that we've seen because of that asset-based listening?
Speaker 2:Yeah, going a little bit back of what the principle?
Speaker 2:Asset-based, I think some of the principles and the one that I love the most because I think it's very biblical. So asset-based community development were two professors at Northwestern University that come up with it. They saw how the approach of many organizations, churches and nonprofits, the approach it's always been naturally to go to a community and look for the needs and look for what's wrong with the community, what's not working. And then these guys said, well, that's not working, right, it's actually created dependency, right, how people, when you focus on the needs and what's wrong in the community is not working. And so they said, well, let's change the approach to be, instead of looking for what's growing, it's look for what's right, and so asset-based community development is focused on that. It's look for what's right, what's good in the community, and then build upon that, the good, those assets that are in the community and, of course, people are the assets. Right, and it's very biblical because I feel like we believe that every human being is created in the image of God.
Speaker 1:Right, so for that reason.
Speaker 2:That means everybody has gifts and talents and dreams and passions, and so if we can focus on that and make sure that we help people to bring that hope back, it's very, very important. And then, so one of the things we say all the time is we refuse to see our neighbors as our clients. They're not our clients. There are people with gifts, there are people with talents, there are people who had something to contribute, and there are people who can come up with solutions for their own problems, and it's more sustainable. If you think about it. Anyways, if they're the ones involved in creating the solutions for their own problems, then they feel part of it, they take ownership, and then it's gonna be more sustainable. So it's not about us doing things for them, but it's doing things with them right.
Speaker 2:How do we do things with them to get that, and so it's always been my kind of our approach. The breakthroughs that we have seen is, for example, with this last we just finished a capital campaign. It was called Hope Unleashed, and again that's the reason behind it was hope. Again, hope is already there. We just need to unleash the hope, and so we name it very intentionally that. So in 2022, we raised $18 million to build that early learning center, that clinic that I mentioned, new offices. We also got some houses, but one of the things that I think is very cool about what the city did is the city came alongside of us to invest in the infrastructure after all of this.
Speaker 2:So we knew foreign community schools were adding to a public school that is across the street from us. It's called Levanscat Academy. They invested $17 million there, the district, so we invested $16 million in our building. And so then there's a city park and we say we're going to raise $500,000 for a total cost of $2.7 million to redevelop this city park, public park in our neighborhood, and I said we're going to raise $500,000. If the city can come with the rest, well, that's under construction now.
Speaker 2:So one of the ways that we have seen breakthrough is that the city saw the vision, saw that it's investment right. There's public and private investment, and so they have been helping us with infrastructure, the park, there's a street that they're going to redevelop, they're putting new sidewalks and all of that. And so all of that has been so cool because we have seen the partnership, the true partnership. Parkview is coming to do services there scan. We have a room in our location that we open up just for them. So they come, because the majority of the people they serve it in South and Southeast, for when anyways? So you know, I think those are so cool, the partnerships, that it's not about just one organization but it's many coming together to really solve the issues and bring the resources necessary for our community. That's really cool.
Speaker 3:That is cool. What was the catalyst for the city to build the infrastructure? I assume it started with an ask by you, but it seems like municipalities any government moves slowly. How did you ever get that?
Speaker 2:That's interesting. It's a good question, I think, yes, you're right. I think we were able to meet with the mayor, mayor Henry, at that time, and at the end of the conversation we were ready to, when he asked how can I help? We had a letter where the foreign community schools. We had the signature of Dr Daniel, we had the signature of the Neighborhood Association president and we had the signature of, for me, richard Grace, and so one of the things we asked in this letter is when he said how can I help? After we show him the vision that we had, I said well, you know, we really would love for you to invest in the streets that are here and then also Brewer Park. We're going to raise money for Brewer Park, but if you could in a way, help us to find and we also met with every city council, every city council, all of them. We met with all of them to make sure that we establish this relationship, we tell them our vision and hopefully, if it comes to them to make a decision later, to help us too. And they did.
Speaker 2:It was a unanimous vote when we moved to a lot of these things, which is incredible. But you build relationship, you build vision communication. It's all of that. We also did some work too right. It's not always asking to the city to come and do it. We have some pocket parks that we established with our neighborhood association and instead of going to the city to ask them for money for that, we actually went to get private funding from grants, and then we asked them to help us just to rezone those pockets, because they were residential, so they had to convert into areas or spaces where people can play and kids can play. That's how they come alongside of us, and I think it's a combination of—.
Speaker 3:Can I summarize something I think he just said on how he did all that? Efficiency is doing things right, effectiveness is doing the right things and excellence is doing the right things right or the right things rightly. I really feel like everything you just described was excellence. So many of us want to just send an email or make a post and we think everything's going to get fixed.
Speaker 2:Everybody's going to do it now. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:But that's not what you did. You met with all the key players individually and took that time to listen, to be heard, and I just think that's powerful. Yeah, that's a great lesson, thank you, yeah, takes time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It takes time and it's a lot of meetings, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think about you talking about, really, even from a neighborhood perspective, seven years to build trust. And so you think about the time from 2012 up to now 2025, how much time to really be diligent and excellent in meeting with people. I can only imagine the no's, or how many times you didn't hear back from people Absolutely no-transcript do. But we know we've been called to do it, so give me a, give me a heart 18 million dollars for the capital campaign.
Speaker 2:It was 350 meetings that we had man.
Speaker 3:And some of the meetings were more than one person.
Speaker 2:Right, we had multiple at the time, multiple people meeting Wow.
Speaker 3:It's a lot One a day for a year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right, that's what it is One a day for a year. So I mean, excuse me, these are really great things that we've been talking about, and so I think about the city as a whole, god, whole, god's people. I know you have a heart for the church, capital C. How could you encourage those listening members of the church to embrace this similar heart that you've been talking about? Not only you. I know your wife and your team have this heart.
Speaker 1:How can we just go and live that out? Where I live, where I work?
Speaker 2:where.
Speaker 1:I rest my head. How would you encourage people to adopt this mentality?
Speaker 2:I think, realizing that the kingdom of God, right, what God wants really is to restore, not just the soul. I think we have this Western culture mentality that the soul is totally different from the body, or, you know, let's save the soul and don't worry about the body so much because it's going to be destroyed. And no, that's not true. You know, the Bible is really clear about this. And so Luke, chapter 2, where Jesus is being introduced, he's introducing his ministry, right, and what he came to do, it's in Luke, chapter 2, where he's at the synagogue and opens the scroll right and reads from Isaiah and he talks about who he is. And so he said I'm here to proclaim the word right, the good word. But he didn't stay there. He didn't stay just proclaiming. What else did he say? He said I'm here to also heal the sick, and the blind will receive sight right and the cripple will walk. And so he's talking about this holistic, this holistic approach to. He's not talking about just the soul, I'm going to just preach the good word, I also going to restore the sick.
Speaker 2:And to what is he saying? He's saying is to restore to the original of how I created it, what I wanted to do. And so when I look at my community and our communities, we have to look at it that way too. That is not just about, like, the physical aspect is not there, right? I'm sure it wasn't not the intention of God to see it that way.
Speaker 2:And then so it's the spiritual, it's the holistic mindset. So I think we have to adopt that and think that way too right in our communities, wherever we are and sometimes it is, maybe that is the soul, is the spiritual aspects of our community, and to think about that, maybe the way you have to restore this neighborhood or your community where you are is totally different than what I'm looking in Southeast because of just what happened, but it's always something right. That is wrong, because God wants us to have this good relationship with Him, but also with one another, with ourselves. And so what is it that needs to be restored in this type? This work, wherever you live, wherever you are, and always have that mindset of the kingdom of God, is more than just the soul, it's really everything, it's a whole holistic approach.
Speaker 1:That is excellent, it's beautiful. Yeah, you know, it reminds me of Colossians 1, where Paul is writing about Christ is supreme, jesus is supreme and he talks from him and to him and through him, all things, and then he speaks to that very thing, javier, which is supreme. Jesus is supreme and he talks, you know, from him and to him and through him, all things, and then he speaks to that very thing, javier, which we know is he's restoring things, he's redeeming things, and it's for him, but in our work and in our leadership and in our neighboring, to have the mindset that you just talked about, via Jesus' word and himself, in regards to, yeah, even as we sit here today, he has a heart to restore and redeem all things, and he is, he is doing it. And I think about Colossians 1, because it's just a reminder that in the work that we do, it's not just work, and in the lives that we're living, it's not just life, it's we can partner with him in the restorative work that he will do and that he is doing.
Speaker 2:You have to have the right mindset of what human flourishing means Correct, and that is going to be key. If you have the right mindset and the right definition of what that means, then you're going to understand better. This is probably another podcast, but we're starting a new series Just because you know, I used to hate conversations. This is probably another podcast, but we're starting a new series. I used to hate conversations. I used to hate when people would say, because I'm a doer, I'm a community development practitioner, I'm a doer. I always feel like I have to be doing something action, writing things. Sometimes it's hard for me to sit down and just kind of listen and hear. That's all we do now in the neighborhood, right, and so we do a lot of listening, a lot of things that we do for that. But one of the things that I have been thinking about and I'm reading, thinking about human flourishing. What does that mean? There's two things that I'm going to speak about this in the series that we're doing about breaking the cycle of poverty. What does it mean?
Speaker 2:A framework for understanding poverty is that the opposite of poverty is not the American dream. The opposite of poverty is not the American dream, and I'll tell you why. Because the American dream, the way it is today, is not working, right. I mean, think about there's a lot of stats about that the economy is better than what we were, you know, 20, 30, 40 years ago. It's better today.
Speaker 2:People are prosperous, people are getting better when it comes to income, the more rich, but if you think of all, the problems are not still the same, right. And you have even bigger problems with mental health with. You know, suicide is even more right, higher, right in young people, like all these issues, right? And how is it that when the country or it's becoming better when it comes to the economy, you have a better, better economy, but the problems are even getting worse, right? And so if the the opposite of poverty is not necessarily the american dream, the opposite of our neighborhoods or community, in our community, for example, is not to make them like the suburbs either, yeah, yeah, that's not the, because a lot of people think that way that, oh, maybe we should just have the community change to be more like the suburbs. But that's not it, that's not the answer either. So human flourishing looks different. It's this relationship between you and God and one another and ourselves.
Speaker 3:That's right, that's good. That's the opposite of poverty. Is the human flourishing in a vibrant relationship with God and community.
Speaker 2:I believe so. I think I'm still dealing with that, I'm still thinking about what that means, but I think it's more than just because it can be people who are poor, who have maybe means and have possessions, but that doesn't mean they are rich in every way, because poverty is not just about possessions either, right it's more than that, yeah.
Speaker 3:um, restored means to be made new again. Yeah, so we have to come to the designer in order to experience his original design, the only one. Correct yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, as our friend, our mutual friend, joe Johnson, you know, to see people in places flourish again, again, again. And I think we have to have that mindset again back to what you mentioned when we originally were going through that first question. Javier, it's jesus spoke to his heart for a full redemption, and what does that look like? It's beyond soul to see people healed, see people thriving, see people in community with him and with one another. Um, but he designed it that way, yes, um, and we live in a fallen world. So I love that, joe. I learned that lexicon, I've just held onto it. It's again, because that's the father's heart, that's what he's going to do. But I think when the disciples said, well, how should we pray? He said your kingdom come on earth. So we have to take that literally. If the Savior said it, he wants us to experience what we will experience in the new heaven and new earth.
Speaker 1:And he said that we can. We can experience in this flourish a glimpse of it, a taste of it, life and life in full here on this side of eternity, and I think that's the heart of it. Look at Isaiah 65 a whole lot as a framework to what neighborhoods and what it could be like for people where we live more fuller lives and healthier lives, where babies aren't dying anymore and young people are growing older and just those different things. I think that's the heart of the Father and the things that you're speaking to most definitely. John 10, right, john 10, yeah.
Speaker 2:Live life and live life to the fullest.
Speaker 1:What does that mean? Yeah, yeah, live life and live life to the fullest. What does that mean, yeah, yeah. What's the look of that? So I?
Speaker 2:was thinking of that. What does that mean? What would Jesus wanted to say when? What is he saying to us? What does that mean? It's because poverty is not just about possessions, and so for us, at the end of the day, it's also the spiritual aspect. It's that good relationship and relationship that they have to have with the Creator, with one another, with your world, with everything right.
Speaker 1:It's a holistic approach so good, well, I think this. So we've talked about this a little bit. But you know, as you think about bridge of grace, so you think about southeast and even our city. You know what are some things that you're hopeful for in the lord and that you're even envisioning for you guys's work and just our city as a whole going forward.
Speaker 2:Well, I think love for wayne is going to be key here too. Right, love for Wayne and the vision and the mission of Love for Wayne to bring community together, the churches and nonprofits, the whole community, the city, to really love on our community and the different pillars that we have. I think you know I'm passionate about it because I think it's important. I think it's important we need that umbrella, that organization that can help us bring everyone together to love our schools, to love our pastors, to love our leaders, to you know, all of these different pillars that are so important. Prayer, prayer. Right, I say that how important that is to pray for our city, because only then we can see when God moves in all these initiatives that we have. So I believe that is important.
Speaker 2:I'm looking at Southeast only, but you know, of course I want the best for the city, but when I'm looking at Southeast there is about 40 neighborhoods, more than 40 neighborhoods, just in the Southeast quadrant. There's about 50,000 people living in our community. What we have seen and what I heard about other ministries in other cities as well that are doing community development, is if we can take this geographical area of the Southeast Quadrant with these neighborhoods. I think one of the things that I've been dreaming about and I've been talking to some of the funders is can we take a few neighborhoods strategically around this geographical area with potential of development? What we have seen in our neighborhood is that the other neighborhoods around are being affected positively by the development that has happened here. Right now there's other neighborhoods that are being also affected positively with the economy, with the moving people and the infrastructure and everything else. So if we can take neighborhoods like that strategically, then you know the flourishing of that neighborhood, the development of that neighborhood is going to overfill, to go to the next ones. The other ones are going to be affected.
Speaker 2:So I'm looking at that and I was like which ones are those? Can we pray? Can we pray for God to show us which ones are those strategic neighborhoods that we can take on to do some investment and development, where the private sector, these nonprofits, will come and resource the business community, the corporations all together to really invest and see the kingdom of God flourish in those neighborhoods and then the other ones will be affected the same way and again, it's not just the physical investment but it's also that spiritual, the relationship base and all of that. So that's kind of my dream, I think, for the city is the same right. The churches, all the churches around the city, can do the same and thinking that way strategically on how to touch every community, every neighborhood, then the city would, I think, would, flourish.
Speaker 3:Javier, we ask our guests this question and I'm really intrigued with what you might say Looking back in the rearview mirror. What would you say to like your 16 year old self in mexico? Um, in terms of leadership, what would you? What do you wish you could say to that person? Your younger self back?
Speaker 2:then there's a reason you didn't send me that question in advance. You should have sent me in advance so that I can think about um man, so many things, things. I never in my life I thought I would be here today and having to lead a nonprofit like this right, and I just didn't ever cross my mind. In fact, when I went to seminary to be a pastor, I didn't go for a community development or anything like this, and this is what we're doing. I think the one thing I would say when I was thinking about God calling me into ministry is to have more faith. To have more faith.
Speaker 2:I think that my faith was, even though I was positive and everything, I never knew I would be here today.
Speaker 2:And I think, with the years and the struggles and different issues that we have had, because there's a lot of doors that close on me too At the beginning there was a breakup of another church that we were partnered with. We were with them, working, and we had to actually come apart, separate from them, because we just couldn't work together and we wouldn't be where we are today if it didn't happen. But at that moment I didn't want to go through that right. There was some relationships that we lost on that and all of that, and it was really hard and I didn't have enough faith. But then there was a time and a point, after going through a lot of difficulties, that my faith kind of grew and said no, but God has to have a plan for this and I have to trust Him more. I have to trust Him more. And so I think it's yeah, it's depending on him and having more faith that he would do what he promised he would do.
Speaker 3:I love that. I think anyone who takes the scriptures seriously can learn them and end up relying on their own interpretation of what they can remember about those scriptures. But we forget what Jesus said that they testify to him, that they're a means to him and we really need to trust in him. We need to trust him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what a beautiful principle, Javier. It's been a joy man. This is great.
Speaker 3:This is great, I'm going to have to get off set and take some notes. I feel the same.
Speaker 1:Listen to it, like you guys will have listened to it, and I'm asking you to go back the same. Thank you, listen to it, like you guys will have listened to it, and I'm asking you to go back, rewind it. There are some things that stood out to you. Go back, write those things down. We talked about last month, jeremy shared. Sometimes we hear things that touch us leadership things that touch us. We never go back and visit them again. So if there's something in this episode that grabbed your heart, grabbed your attention, again, go back, check it out, write it down. Javier, again, thank you so much for joining us and we pray that this podcast episode has been a blessing to you and until you are tuned in next time, we pray that God will bless you and keep you and we will share with you again on the next Love Fort Wayne Leadership Podcast.
