Woodworking ministry breaks down barriers

By BECKY JONES

VANCOUVER, Wash. -- Community, hope, renewal, inspiration, self-esteem, truth. Those are the words Duane Sich uses to describe a unique ministry that reaches out to homeless people in Vancouver. Friends of the Carpenter, a non-profit, ecumenical organization Sich founded two years ago, takes trained volunteers into homeless shelters and uses the simple activity of woodworking to break down barriers and begin building friendships.

Sich, who was a Presbyterian pastor for 28 years, says he started the ministry after witnessing first-hand the difficulties of ministering to the poor through the church. “Every week, sometimes everyday, we would have homeless people stop by needing help,” he recalled. “Every time they would want money -- money for a hotel, housing, gasoline, or to pay medical bills --and so you’d visit with them and talk with them. We had a benevolence fund, but what the church is about is to help them connect with and relate to the body of Christ. I faithfully invited every one of them to come back and worship with the church. I didn’t need five fingers to count everybody that came back. It was too scary, it was too intimidating.”

To solve that problem, Sich found a way to take the church to the homeless shelter. “The vision was creating an environment where everyone felt safe and welcome, an environment that we Christians took for granted,” he explained. “We needed something to do to take the focus off our differences and provide an activity to draw us together. That’s where the friendships are formed.”

A lifelong woodworker, Sich found the camaraderie that develops when people work together to be just the tool he was looking for. In addition to the woodworking, volunteers lead in worship and a devotional time. At the end of each event, Friends of the Carpenter provides participants with the equivalent of $5 in Fred Meyer certificates, gasoline vouchers, 60 minute phone cards or bus tokens.

Jan Cox, program manager for Friends of the Carpenter, sees the woodworking as a way to move beyond the more traditional ministry of helping serve meals in a homeless shelter. “You’re getting past that counter that separates you from them and serving,” she said. “When you get over that counter, sitting around the table, there’s that fellowship that breaks down barriers. You’re working together and they’re contributing, they’re teaching.

“In many cases the people that are there benefiting from the voucher program are leading the work at table because they’ve been there month after month and know how to build a plant caddy,” she added. “So they’re teaching and it’s building their self-esteem."

Sich is quick to point out, however, that the ministry taking place is really a two-way street. “What's truly amazing to me is how the volunteers have been blessed,” he said. “In no other ministry that I’ve been involved in have I seen the volunteers so gratified and stimulated in their faith.”

“We acknowledge that God's grace is sufficient, but we have so many other securities that it really does minimize our faith,” he continued. “When you’re with someone who doesn’t have these things, it clarifies the faith that we profess and that we should have.”

“It provides the opportunity to meet and become a part of the life of people who we wouldn’t typically be able to get to know,” Cox added. “I’ve met some outstanding people who have life experiences that I can learn from and who I admire for their fortitude and their strength.”

Additionally, Sich has seen the ministry serve as a catalyst for relationships among the homeless people themselves. “What we've found is that our events have created a fellowship right at the shelter,” he said. “People that were in close proximity really had no motivation to support each other and create a community. By having this activity it generates that kind of nurturing within themselves, it gives them the motivation to help themselves and to help their friends.”

As an example of this, Sich points to Sam, a man he says was “just in the doldrums of homelessness. He was depressed, using alcohol, unemployed. He had burned his bridges with his family.” Through the ministry of Friends of the Carpenter, Sich says Sam found friendships and encouragement that motivated him to re-establish a relationship with his infant son.

Although Sam recently passed away, the ministry was able to reach out to him even in the hospital. “Sam was in the hospital and not expected to survive,” Sich said, “He suffered from complications of illness and past behavior. But the beauty was there were more than 20 people from Friends of the Carpenter, homeless people that came to the hospital. Typically in intensive care you have to be a family member to come in and see someone in the hospital, but all these people were accepted as family and they welcomed us.”

“This is really grassroots and front line,” Sich concluded. “The front line of missions is not in the sanctuary, but with the poor that Christ came to reach out to.”

For more information, visit the ministry’s Website at www.friendsofthecarpenter.org or call 360-750-4752