PARK KEEPERS
A Bit
About Scott
I am a prayer planter, a question asker, a story collector and Jesus listener. I love to pitch ideas, discover geniuses and build teams that get kingdom things done. I have been married to Moon for 18 years, and we have two brilliant sons, Uriah and Elijah. I believe the Holy Spirit is always the smartest person in the room. I believe that Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. I believe Our Father is hallowed when we pray like His son taught us. Rogers Park has been making me its neighbor for 27 years. I recently was called to be the pastor of a church we started with a band of pure-in-heart Jesus followers. God is helping us remember the Jesus way so that we might see His kingdom come.
A Bit
About Moon
I don't think it's any coincidence that God put Scott, a visionary, and myself, someone who tends to exist in the details, together. As a first-generation immigrant, whose parents worked 15 hours days, seven days a week for over 30 years, it is in my DNA "to do." About 20 years ago, I answered God's call to come to Chicago. I moved in downtown and began teaching junior high school on Chicago's west side. But I didn't just come with a calling, I also came with a chronic pain condition. It took me years to admit the new limitations this illness put on my ability "to do." This lesson has had a huge impact on how Scott and I view ministry. There is simply not enough people and resources to execute all the vision Scott dreams up or address all the needs we encounter.
When Paul beckoned God to take away his thorn, God responded, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Paul's takeaway was "I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." God has waited patiently for me to let go, surrender, confess and invite Him into all the painful places of my body and my life. This lesson has been a gift to me and to Scott.
Jesus chose 12 disciples to walk alongside. He taught them by example by doing only what the Father was doing. Abiding with God and with each other is the main "to do" for all of us. The limitations that have come with chronic illness and pain has also been my greatest opportunity to do the work of the Father. I am convinced that if we can learn to be in God's presence and teach others to do the same, then we will see His kingdom come and His will be done in our communities as it is in Heaven.
Why raise support?
We believe a stable local church is absolutely necessary for the stabilization of our city's most violent, most destabilized micro-neighborhoods.
We believe that once a local church is established and its members are resurrected out of poverty the church can become self-sustaining, and eventually plant other churches to do the same.
The local church is a congregations of believers doing life together under God appointed leadership. It took about 25 years from the time I landed in the community for God to put together a team willing to establish a church here and be in it for the long haul. Our church started with a prayer retreat. We read through the book of Acts, prayed, worshipped, listened to one another and sought the voice of God. Then we wrote it down and those became our values. Our desire is to establish a people after God's own heart in the North of Howard neighborhood.
