End of the road

It has been said the only two gurantees in life are death and taxes.  I think most people would agree that if you were to add a third item to the list it would be change.  With Doulos Ministries I have experienced many seasons of change.  I said goodbye to my good friends in Denver, CO when the organization relocated to Kansas City over four years ago.  I had to make a difficult choice to leave family and some of the best people I have known for a new adventure in Missouri.  I watched the closure of our inner city ministry, the discipleship program, and the Branson campus.  Many leaders, friends, co-laborers, and even my wife Jena sacrificed and served the ministry before ultimately experiencing the same guranteed fate of change when they, too, left the ministry by circumstance.  After seven plus years with Doulos, my number has come up and my work with the organization is no more.

What happened over the past seven years?  I spent three years in Denver.  One year as a direct care staff working nights and weekends directly with the boys at Shelterwood.  I spent the next two years in Denver as house director working alongside amazing peers and ministry leaders.  I spent four years in Kansas City.  Two as case manager and two more as house director (again).  Although my heart and passion has grown to serve the big brothers and young adults of the ministry, the demanding role of house director ultimately spelled the end.  It is a young mans job and one that is difficult to endure with a family.  I was hopeful that I would be able to move into role more suited for my gifts and abilities but as I pointed out, it is naive to think that I am immune to the change experienced by so many of my beloved past ministry peers and leaders.

To all of my faithful ministry partners, I cannot thank you enough for your prayers and support of my work at Doulos.  I will be able receive your gifts of financial support through the end of the year but my work on campus is finished effective immediately.  I covet your prayers as I search for the next chapter of my life.  Jena and I will remain right here in Kansas City.  When you look at the life of the disciples, you will find that most of them, in the absence of Jesus, returned to what they knew before.  I do not feel that my life in ministry is a closed chapter but for now I will return to what I knew before:  administration, accounting and finance.  If you know of a ministry or finance lead, I would certainly appreciate it.  Please know that you have made a difference.  Parents, teens, big brothers and staff have been affected by your faithful support of my work at Doulos.  Thank you, dearly.

Blessings,
Brian Albright

Happy Halloween

I trust you and your friends and family have a fun and safe Halloween.  The Halloween season is one of the most popular since it starts pretty much after Labor Day with almost two months of preparation.  Last night Jena and I hosted a Harvest party at our home with friends from work. We had the usual fall stuff (chili, queso, and an outside fire pit). Tonight, Jena and I will venture out to Chipotle to get the $2 burrito before returning home to take Kaiden around the neighborhood as Captain America.

Speaking of scary news...last weekend was Shelterwood Parent Retreat.  I am happy to report the event went extremely well.  With over 30 families and 120 folks in attendance, we had plenty of contingency plans in place for the anticipated drama but it all worked out.  God was faithful, families were blessed and that's what matters!

Kansas City Elite

My friend Blake was recently nominated as a candidate for the Kansas City Elite Foundation sponsored by NAPA Auto Parts.  KC Elite is a program by which NAPA gives back to those who serve in the community.  Blake (pictured in the middle), currently serves as a substitute teacher at Shelterwood.  Blake graduated as big brother in June and also works at a local church.  Even though Blake has a seminary masters degree, he humbly serves in a modest role at Shelterwood and as a church volunteer.  To top it off, Blake is an underdog who achieves despite living with cerebral palsy.  With all the credentials mentioned, Blake was awarded the KC Elite prize of $2500 worth of auto work on his beat-up Toyota pick-up truck provided by NAPA parts and local dealers.  In addition, Blake was interview by the Speed Channel, Fox Channel 4 and he personally met the driver of the NAPA Auto Parts NASCAR #56, Martin Truex Jr (pictured to the left of Blake).  I had a chance to watch all of this unfold last Thursday as Blake was honored.

Oh yeah, there was one more small detail.  The prize included two tickets to Sunday's NASCAR race at the Kansas Speedway, VIP parking and access to Hospitality Village in the NAPA tent.  It was a tough sacrifice, but I accepted when Blake asked if I would join him for the race.  I actually had never experienced a live NACAR race and it was incredible.  The roar of the stock car engines was something I will never forget.  In case you're wondering, Matt Kennseth won the race (#17) and Truex finished in 2nd.

In some Shelterwood news, the Beyond Week activities when well last week.  The students served the community on Monday and Thursday followed by Friday's Fun Day.  Fun Day included a co-ed coffee house in the Dining Hall with open mic and later a food fight on the hill.  There are plenty of pictures on the SW Facebook page if you'd like to see them.

This weekend begins our Fall Family Retreat for parents of the boys.  I ask for your prayers for this busy time on our campus.  We are now at maximum capacity of 32 male residents.

Random News from the Wood

At the midway point through October, Shelterwood is trucking along.  Yesterday, one of my big brothers point out the date which read:  10 11 12.   In the busyness of life I sometimes miss those random moments.  I tend to look for significant events to center by blog entries around and nothing epic  came to mind so I figured I would catch you up on some random news from the Wood.

Last weekend we hosted our Girls Family Weekend.  We had another great time providing support for the parents and coaching families as they spent four days on campus with their teens.

Tis the season for the flu and it has ravashed the guys house.  It is now mostly passed but not without a trace.  I believe all but five of our thirty residents caught a piece of it including many of our big brothers.  At one point in the week, 9 boys stayed home from school.  As of today, though, everyone is  healthy!

We have recently hired a Recreational Therapist.  This is a new position and our rec therapist, KaraLee, will be developing therapuetic activities and sessions with our residents on a weekly basis.  I have already been involved in some staff team building and I was impressed.  KaraLee brings a  wealth of experience and the recreation program increases the quality of Shelterwood.

Today we celebrated the graduation of one of our residents, Seth.  Seth actually graduated earlier in the year from Shelterwood High School and was able to complete the final stage of our program at home while attending college.  He returned today for a ceremony and reports from his parents indicate that he is doing quite well back at home.

Next week is our semi-annual Beyond Shelterwood Week.  Two of the five weekdays we will be venturing out into the community into several groups to serve other organizations.  The residents will be in school for two days and one day is reserved for "fun."  KaraLee and her team will be organizing campus wide activities.

Jim Subers is several weeks into a weekly Bible study he leading for the entire guys house.  Jim has a real heart for evangelism and he is taking the boys through the Beautiful Outlaw video series based on the book by John Eldridge.  The boys are really enjoying the experience and it doesn't hurt that some sort of grilled meat is included every week.  

If you have few moments while reading this blog, please say a quick prayer for our big brothers and sisters.  They do incredible work and can always use some extra support from our vast Shelterwood family.  

Working for the Parent Weekend

Tomorrow is one of Shelterwood's "All Property Serve Days."  The weather is calling for 70-something so the experience should be reasonable.  Next weekend we will be hosting our Girls Family Weekly and it's time to spruce things up for our wonderful families.  Lots of good times and memories surround these famous work days dating back to Denver.  During the month of October we will be hosting both family weekend experiences.  The Guys will be at the end of the month.

Last Friday we concluded the second of our two day Shelterwood spiritual retreats for our staff.  It was an amazing time of professional development, fellowship, personal growth and spiritual healing.  Over 30 staff members rotated through one of the two events.  We hope to continue to develop the retreat process in order to reach out to all departments including teachers, counselors, and other support staff.

Things continue to progress at Shelterwood.  Last weekend our board of Directors were in town for a planned meeting.  According to Jim Subers, our CEO, the meeting went well and our business leaders are encouraged and pleased with life, growth and business at Shelterwood.  We currently stand at 30 boys and 26 girl residents along with 13 big brothers and 11 big sisters.  We have come a long ways with much work to do and your prayers and support have made the difference!

Rooted 101

For the past several months our Shelterwood Director has been working to bring the concepts of Healing for The Nations to our campus.  Several of our staff have been afforded the opportunity to attend one of the monthly scheduled intensive retreats.  It's difficult to summarize in a blog, but in essence HFN deals with spiritual healing from the false beliefs we carry in our hearts  about ourselves.  Lies.

 For more information, you can check out the HFN website at  http://www.healingforthenations.org/

Over the next two weeks, we will be taking our big brothers and big sisters through a condensed two day retreat titled "Rooted".  The retreat/training will take our staff through a Shelterwood history from Richard Beach to Kansas City.  Additionally the training will cover residential concepts including Love and Logic, Mindset, De-escalation and ultimately land on the subject of spiritual health and the need for the Holy Spirit in our lives as staff working with at-risk youth.  It's a lot to take in for a two day period but I have been working with Director, Rujon Morrison on a way to present the profound spiritual truth of HFN in a culturally relevant way to our young adult staff at Shelterwood.  It should be fun.

The retreat is scheduled for September 20-21 and September 27-28.  In order to maintain adequate supervision in the house, half of the staff will attend each conference.  Please keep our big brothers and sisters in your prayers as we take them through Rooted 101.

Go Dawgs!

For all of you die hard sports fans, I have a story to tell...

Last Saturday was the inaugural football game for the Missouri Tigers in the Southeastern Conference.  Kind of a big deal.  Last year Mizzou left the Big 12 Conference and joined the high profile SEC.  The first game on the schedule was the University of Georgia Bulldogs.  The game was televised nationally on ESPN and game tickets were hard to come by.  Lucky for us, we have some connections at Georgia and a crazy group of us guys scored free tickets in the UGA booster section five rows in front of the marching band.  It was raucous.  Good times and amazing fellowship.  The game was played in Columbia, MO which is 100 miles east.  With a 7pm kick-off time, TV time-outs and plenty of traffic, we arrived home at 2:30am.  I was worth every minute.  Pictured left to right are my brothers and friends Blake, BJ, myself, Jimmy and Adam!

As much fun as the game was, we still had time to display Christ.  In the bumper-to-bumper traffic jam following the game, two unfortunate Missouri college girls had a car overheat right in front of us. The poor ladies were terrified as folks were hollering to "turn off the engine."  They had no idea what to do and the traffic was unforgiving.  Well, four crazy Georgia fans from Doulos stepped in.  We jumped out and pushed their car to the side of the road.  In addition, we repaired the radiator hose temporarily allowing them to safely drive back to the dorm.  Of course, they have no idea we are from Doulos or even believers in Christ but they were thrilled to receive the help and it was the right thing to do!

The football game was yet another reminder that community is what matters most.  Sure we stay busy with all the hustle and bustle of Shelterwood but the life lesson is that people always matter.