Dream Center Ministry in LA Times

Cameron and Eric had been emailing some about helping with the Dream Center ministry, and I noticed this article on the front of today's LA Times... It gives more backstory  on the group, which I wasn't familiar with before Cameron mentioned them online.

My favorite quote from it is "Increasingly, there is an emergent form of Pentecostalism that balances [proselytizing] with Jesus' proclamation to love others as yourself," said professor Donald E. Miller, executive director of USC's Center for Religion and Civic Culture. "They affirm that God's love is unconditional and therefore their service to other people should, likewise, be unconditional."If this expression of the Christian message results in people committing their lives to Jesus, so be it," Miller added. "But Christians are first of all called to be servants to others, not propagandists."

Excerpts from the Times article below:

For two days after Hurricane Katrina made a ruin of his New Orleans neighborhood, David Mince, 50, waited on the roof of his flooded 9th Ward house, eating Spam and crackers, watching dead cats, dogs and humans float by, and waving to helicopters until one finally rescued him.

A few days later at a Baton Rouge shelter, his surreal week took another strange turn. A representative of the Dream Center, a Christian ministry based at the former Queen of Angels Hospital near Echo Park, offered Mince a free Lear jet ride to Los Angeles.

Within hours, he'd arrived in Southern California, where he was offered free room, board and medical care for a year. He picked out a free wardrobe of new clothes. A Dream Center volunteer helped him look for work as a marine electrician.

For the last 10 years, the Dream Center — an Assemblies of God church that is also supported by the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel — has ministered to L.A.'s poor, sick and homeless.

That ministry, along with the center's massive facility, Dream Center officials say, has put the group in a perfect position to assist with hurricane relief.

"This clicks so well with our vision: 'They may not have anything, but they are worth something,' " said Gina Hanley, a worker at the ministry.

Already, the Dream Center has taken in 200 hurricane survivors, mostly families who indicated to center volunteers in Louisiana that they would be interested in relocating. They have been promised care for at least 12 months. Center officials say they have room for as many as 300 evacuees, a number they expect to reach by Sunday.

Just how they will pay for the care they've promised the arrivals, though, is still not entirely apparent. Pastor Matthew Barnett, a 31-year-old with a baby face and a crew cut, said he "stepped out in faith" when deciding to host the evacuees, confident that God would provide even though the center had been struggling just to meet its pre-Katrina monthly budget of about $550,000.

"We could miss God if we didn't do this," said Barnett, who added that donations from individuals and businesses have more than kept pace with the center's evacuee-related needs so far.

Since the Dream Center made public its plan this week, lines of cars and trucks, filled with food and supplies, have formed outside its headquarters. People have stopped by with $100 bills or called in with pledges to sponsor families for six months. Trinity Broadcasting Network donated $100,000 to assist with hurricane relief. Twenty-nine corporations had representatives at a job fair for evacuees at the center Friday, and government officials have set up tables there to get benefits flowing.

It has also made the Dream Center a national model for Pentecostal and other churches, which have found that younger Christians often want to see the tangible results of their faith.

"Increasingly, there is an emergent form of Pentecostalism that balances [proselytizing] with Jesus' proclamation to love others as yourself," said professor Donald E. Miller, executive director of USC's Center for Religion and Civic Culture. "They affirm that God's love is unconditional and therefore their service to other people should, likewise, be unconditional.

"If this expression of the Christian message results in people committing their lives to Jesus, so be it," Miller added. "But Christians are first of all called to be servants to others, not propagandists."

Church officials acknowledged that they would be pleased if the evacuees and others became born-again Christians, but their assistance is offered with no strings attached.

"The philosophy here is to help people because they are made in God's image," said Eric Brockhoff, who works in the center's Hope for Homeless Youth agency, which provides services for prostitutes, gang members and drug addicts. "We hope they will find God, but that's really up to them. We're not manipulating people or buying them. We're just serving them."

Church officials see their role in helping the evacuees as providential and hope that their plight might raise awareness — and money — for others with similar needs in Los Angeles.

Only seven floors of the former Queen of Angels building are in use, with room for about 700 people. Renovating the other eight floors, which would provide 1,500 additional beds, would cost $8 million, church officials said.

"We could fill all those rooms today," Barnett said.

The Dream Center was established in 1994 when Barnett, a 20-year-old Assemblies of God pastor, took over Bethel Temple in Echo Park. His co-pastor was his father, Tommy, an Assemblies of God minister who headed a church in Phoenix and now splits his time between the Phoenix and Los Angeles churches.

Comments

[Phill Celver]

I would like to get in touch with my old Friend, Eric Brockhoff. Please help me. He was origninal from Washignton and is currently in ministry.

Phill Celver
pmcelver@comcast.net

[Sue Sabas]

?Blessings upon the Barnett's - and their families - both in Phoenix and Los Angeles.

May the Lord continue to guide them, and provide for all their needs. We thank them both for serving Los Angeles, Ca., and bringing the love of Christ to the hard and cold streets. The Lord has honored their devotion, as they continue to honor him, may the Glory be spread all over the world.

Sue Sabas

[ro nald]

I would like to get in touch with some one in your ministry ,who is responsible for care of poor of the poorest and vulneable children.

[ro nald]

I would like to get in touch with some one in your ministry ,who is responsible for care of poor of the poorest and vulnable children.

[diego]

some ouf us passed 'a passion for gods word test lesson' 10000000 percent thank the gospel inside news......
have happy very happy holidays from the men future minister moses diego mateo.....

[Christine Scott]

Shane Finch, he works for you, left a friend of mine a text on her phone and she text me. That 22 missionaries in Afghanastan are going to be executed today. I've sent an e-mail to all my Prayer Warriors to Pray. But I can't find where or if it's happening. Can you help me?