The BTSR graduates and members of their Charlotte team posed on the steps of a seminary building after a long day working on the grounds. (Photos by Lindsay Marsh)
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RICHMOND — The grounds at Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond underwent a massive sprucing this summer as six 2005 graduates of the school — with a cadre of youth in tow — returned to campus to “lend a hand to some folks who were instrumental in our faith development.”
The six alumni — Greg and Helms Jarrell, Michael and Christine Kellett and Jason and Joan Williams — are members of the Hyaets Community, a Charlotte, N.C., ministry based in economically-depressed Enderly Park, a high-crime, low-income neighborhood.
Hyaets, organized in 2005, is a community-building organization that includes an intentional Christian community, an urban ministry and retreat experiences.
“We decided to live life together, holding our goods and monies in common, and living among the poor,” said Greg Jarrell. “Our belief is that since Jesus says the poor are blessed because the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to them, we should take that seriously.
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“The poor have something to teach us who are middle class that we cannot learn without them,” said Jarrell. “Our basic posture toward our neighbors is that they are our teachers and that we should listen to them.”
For the past two years, members of Hyaets (the Hebrew word roughly translates as “tree of life”) have taken youth in their neighborhood — most of whom live in low-income families — on a mission week. This year the group selected a June week in Richmond and combined their efforts with youth from two Charlotte churches: Park Road Baptist Church, where Michael Kellett serves, and Christ United Methodist Church, where both the Williamses serve.
Richmond was chosen “for a couple of reasons,” said Jarrell. Hyaets has a close connection with Huguenot Road Baptist Church in Richmond, which four times a year sends teams to work with the community, funded in part by a grant from the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, he said.
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“We maintain a good network of friendships and supporters in Richmond, which made the planning easy,” he added. “And we love Richmond and miss being there. This was a good chance to reconnect and to lend a hand to some folks who were instrumental in our faith development.”
The team of 30 middle and high schoolers — plus their leaders and two interns from the Baptist Convention of North Carolina — found plenty to do at BTSR, where they painted and puttied some of the buildings, and weeded, trimmed, bagged and mulched the grounds.
BTSR maintenance staff prepped the campus prior to the week and directed the work crews in a variety of projects, said Ka’thy Gore Chappell, associate dean for student life and enrollment at BTSR.
“We were excited to be part of this event that was truly a partnership between a variety of non-profit agencies and churches,” said Chappell.
During the week, the team was housed at Huguenot Road church, which also provided meals, along with BTSR and other area churches.
“The work at BTSR was very well received and was a tremendous affirmation for us as graduates,” said Jarrell. “It was an opportunity for us to give back to an institution that was formative for us, and their gratitude in receiving the work we did was an affirmation of the ministries we are doing now.
“And we loved being able to introduce our youth to the people and places that were formative and significant to us in discerning the calls that we are living out now,” he added.
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While in Richmond, the Charlotte team also worked with SynerGeo, an Oregon Hill-based community building organization, and Tabernacle Baptist Church, in the city’s Fan neighborhood. Much of their time was spent in a day camp for children of refugees.
“Our youth and interns were moved by hearing the stories of the refugees who had left their homes and families,” said Jarrell. “Their struggles and their successes were important and meaningful stories for our youth to hear.”
Jarrell noted that the youth from the Hyaets neighborhood have in the past been recipients of the same kind of work they took on in Richmond.
“We loved seeing them have an extended opportunity to give of themselves and to use their gifts,” he said. “We live in a situation where gentleness is not necessarily valued. Our kids have to learn to be tough. Being in Richmond that week allowed them to exercise their gifts with humility and kindness, and it allowed us to see and experience those tender sides of them and to keep calling those out of them in the weeks following.”
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For the Hyaets Community members, the week was a familiar pattern, not unlike the work they carry out in their west Charlotte neighborhood.
The Jarrells and Williamses live in adjacent houses — the Jarrells with their son and the two interns, the Williamses with their daughter and two other young members of the neighborhood.
“Our days generally consist of work — we each maintain part-time jobs outside our neighborhood in order to pay the bills — with the balance of our time being given to our neighbors,” said Jarrell.
The Jarrells focus on youth ministry “to help them know that someone cares about them — not always a given here — and to give them a safe place to develop their gifts.”
The Williamses spend time with Enderly Park’s adults, for whom chronic unemployment is a significant problem.
“We always have a crowd of neighbors around the supper table, and we offer our guest beds to neighbors when they experience a housing crisis,” said Jarrell.
Robert Dilday is managing editor of the Religious Herald.