If CGS died during COVID, would Durham weep?
Corollary: When the pandemic ends, will Durham-Chapel HIll rejoice over CGS having been present in the community during COVID?
On Memorial Day Weekend 2021, when the smoke of this COVID fire has begun lifting in earnest and CGS casts a glance over its shoulder, what will we see?
A church - CGS - emerging from its bunker mostly intact, but blinking and shell-shocked and with its rhythms of local ministry temporarily disrupted by the stressors of this COVID season?
Or will we see, rather:
A church more connected intramurally at a "neighborhood" and community group level than was previously the case?
A church distributed into new ministry terrain throughout Durham, leaving new footprints of compassion, mercy, and justice planted throughout our community?
A church family actually more unified around common endeavors than was the case prior to COVID?
What, specifically, are these above questions meant to prompt us towards?
God has provided a defining moment of opportunity to CGS during this COVID blight, and I encourage each of you to join your CGS elders and deacons as they reach out to the Durham Public Schools Foundation in this time of urgent need:
What is our immediate objective?
We are seeking to provide 500 disadvantaged Durham Public Schools (DPS) children with hotspots and wi-fi service for remote learning thru January of 2021. We can accomplish this with a gift of $25,000.
What is the Plan?
DPS Foundation (DPSF) is a charitable 501(c)(3) launched in September of 2018 whose objectives include an "Accelerating Digital Equity" campaign. With this campaign, DPSF is "not only seeking to patch a hole that's been ripped open by the pandemic - they are accelerating a long-overdue response to inequities in our Durham schools".
A representative of CGS' leadership has held extensive conversations with the DPSF leadership team; we have vetted the "Accelerating Digital Equity" campaign extensively. Your Elders (via the Session Discretion Fund) and your Mission Formation Team (via one of its budget line-items) are pledging to match all congregational donations on a dollar-for-dollar basis up to $12,500, which promptly accomplishes the $25,000 objective.
What can I do immediately?
Give. Generously. Now.
DPS classes are already underway or beginning imminently. Additionally, early in September the 1st wave of HOPE-sponsored Learning Centers is set to arrive, and additional digital and technical support is desperately needed now (HOPE is the second plank in the DPSF's response to the educational disruption imposed by COVID - see more about that below).
Your opportunity to give to this effort is time-sensitive: we will conclude this campaign in 17 days, on Sunday September 13, so that we can make our dollars available to the DPSF in a timely manner.
What can I do in addition to giving, over the next 9 months?
Not everything. But several significant somethings, certainly...
1) This CGS overture to the DPS Foundation is a subset of CGS' larger "Three Fs" initiative (Family Advocacy, Food Vulnerability, and Familiar Relationships). Those initiatives emerged from the seminar on Biblical Justice led by Simon Stokes, Aaron McKethan, and Bob Burns:
2) Many of you are already familiar with the Durham FEAST effort that was undertaken this past spring to assist families with young school-aged children who were exposed to food insecurity when DPS initially closed due to COVID. DPS Foundation -- with whom we are partnering in the Accelerating Digital Equity campaign -- was a major co-sponsor of the FEAST effort. That effort is re-emerging under a new name (EAT NC), beginning September 1st. The DPSF-CGS relationship that we are forging will thus provide CGS members with ready access to the EAT NC project, which you can read about here: https://www.durhamfeast.org. Delivering meals to enrolled families provides a simple, humble way to get to know -- and serve -- our Durham community over the course of the next ~ 9 months.
3) The DPS Foundation has also formed the HOPE Network -- an alliance created to facilitate and manage safe, reliable digital learning centers across Durham for disadvantaged students, while COVID restrictions prevail. The CGS leadership is in earnest exploration with DPSF regarding how we might most productively partner with the HOPE Network in the months ahead. Please be actively praying about how you might contribute (volunteer hours) in such a context. As more details emerge, we will update you.
Parting Shots --
Many of you have shared in emails and conversations that "I want to help, but I'm not sure where to start. It seems overwhelming". You can start here:
Help us provide 500 disadvantaged Durham Public Schools (DPS) children with hotspots and wi-fi service for remote learning thru January of 2021. We can accomplish this with an aggregate gift of $25,000. There are over 300 individual "Giving Units" (individuals and/or families that contribute financially) within CGS; "matching" the $12,500 leadership pledge can be accomplished essentially by a mere $40 from each...
Please make your checks and/or online donations payable to Church of the Good Shepherd (not to DPSF), and annotate them with the phrase: "COVID and Beyond". We will deliver -- in person -- a single collective check to the DPS Foundation. If we exceed our $25k goal, those additional monies will comprise a "war chest" which will be targeted by our elders for subsequently identified needs arising from the effects of COVID.
Do not misunderstand the essence of this appeal, acutely timed though it is. Your leadership is not interested in promoting within CGS a culture of "urgent and shiny transactional endeavors"... The transformative work of the Spirit of Christ in our personal lives, in the life of CGS, and in the life of our community is -- as Pastor Chuck reminds us repetitively -- dependent upon a long, slow obedience in the same direction. Transformation (old-fashioned sanctification) is always more difficult than transaction, in spiritual terms. But transformed hearts - surrendered to the Real Jesus - can undertake transactions on behalf of Real People suffering real hardship in this Real World. And if that is the actual motivation that fuels CGS' giving and serving, then that will redound to the praise of God's glorious grace that He lavished upon us in the Beloved One...
Give generously. Godspeed to all --
Glenn Jordan
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