Julie Jones is one of my favorite leaders in the Greater Cleveland Christian community. I served with her on the Board at Bay Presbyterian Church, where she’s currently on staff as Director of Outreach. She’s currently helping to lead an incredibly cool project in which Bay Pres purchased the property of a Catholic parish on the near West side of Cleveland that they’re converting into an urban ministry campus, including a sanctuary for new church plants, a school for kids with learning disorders who fell through the cracks in the city schools, ministry space for partner organizations in the city and a gathering place for the people who live in the neighborhood. I digress…I’m just proud of my old team!

Julie’s very direct in a grace-filled way. Several years ago, she was serving on our Board and helping us plan our regional ministry initiative in Northeast Ohio she posed the question that’s the title of today’s post…”Are we delivering a service or leading a movement?” The obvious answer is both, but I think her purpose in asking the question was to force us to think about the systems we need to have in place and the resources necessary to do both. Today, I want to look at what’s ahead for the “Movement” in the months and years ahead, and share some thoughts about Key Ministry’s role in the Movement.

When I look for evidence that we’re engaged in a “God thing,” one of the strongest affirmations I see that we’re barking up the right tree is the way that God is moving through so many of His followers in different places, with different gifts and in different church traditions to minister to families of kids who have been impacted by disabilities, primarily “hidden disabilities.” Thanks to the wonders of Facebook, we’ve discovered many new ministry colleagues in the past year who have been moved to do neat things in the communities and spheres of influence in which they’ve been planted. Here are a few folks we’ve “met” either in person or online in 2010 who God seems to be positioning to do big things for His Kingdom:

Mike Woods (St. Louis): Mike is an ex-Marine and a parent of three sons with autism spectrum disorders. He works as a behavior analyst in the public schools and leads a ministry organization, Making Room, charged with developing ways to include people with autism into the community of faith.

Barb Dittrich (Milwaukee): Barb is a former investment broker and prolific Facebook poster who leads Snappin’ Ministries, an organization that provides support and encouragement to those living with the daily challenge of parenting a special needs child, so that the genuine love and hope of Jesus will be experienced and shared in their everyday lives.

Aaron Scheffler (Indianapolis): Aaron recently accepted a position in which he is directing U.S. operations for Mark 2 Ministries. Mark 2 Ministries exists to encourage and equip the local church to evangelize, disciple, and integrate into their congregation individuals with disabilities. Aaron has been working with churches in the Greater Indianapolis area through helping churches to develop outreach through offering free respite care to families of kids with disabilities.

Jolene Philo (Iowa): Jolene is a former teacher of gifted and talented students, church staff member and author who has been led to champion the cause of families of kids with critically or chronically ill children. Jolene’s website, A Different Dream was set up to be a resource to parents of “really sick kids.” She’s currently hard at work on her second book for parents of kids with special needs.

Please don’t feel excluded or overlooked if you’re not specifically mentioned…I simply wanted to illustrate a representative sample of the people and organizations being called to the Movement.

On Monday, I’ll share some thoughts about the role God may be preparing Key Ministry to play within the Movement.