Building Trust

I attended the breakfast and work session at West Huntsville Elementary School (WHES) yesterday morning. Along with about 60 other folks from Faith, Principal Johnson, and several of her teachers! Madison County Commission Chairman Mike Gillespie also attended. After breakfast and opening comments, prayer, and singing we fanned out to do some hands on work. There was some landscaping cleanup in the front of the school, some library work, and some assessment of needs for the “Parent Portable”. With that many hands, the work went quickly. It was a very good morning!

In the opening comments, Frank, Ms. Johnson, and Mr. Gillespie emphasized the partnering aspects of this new relationship between Faith and WHES. This partnering relationship is something Faith needs to consider carefully and understand.

More than a few folks seemed disappointed that we couldn’t accomplish more yesterday morning. Everybody saw needs and wanted to run out and get this, or do that, right then. Those urges are good, showing that hearts are in the right place, but we need to keep in mind the broader purpose of God’s plan in this partnership. In these very early stages it’s about building trust between the partners!

As someone said, WHES is Ms. Johnson’s house! You wouldn’t want someone coming into your house telling you what you need to do. We need to build the dialog and trust to determine together how we can help most. As an example, the portable needs some interior painting. I suspect WHES parents are hard strapped to find time to contribute a lot of help to WHES. Perhaps we need to go that extra mile to meet with the parents responsible for the portable to pick a color, on their terms? Now picking a color isn’t a huge thing and maybe they would simply be happy to have it painted, but it is an opportunity to build some of that trust between partners. Gain that bit of trust and there might be a parent or two that show up to help?

Mr. Gillespie has a small budget to help out in this effort. But it isn’t a blank check. It’s just good stewardship to coordinate efforts to best prioritize and allocate those resources. Again, that’s part of building trust in this partnership. Gain that bit of trust and next year may have a bigger budget?

It’s also about building trust at Faith. Trust between each other and our trust in God’s plan. We all get impatient and start to exercise our own wills. We need to keep in mind whose work we are doing!

Now I’m not suggesting we slow this down to a Presbyterian crawl! I am suggesting that in this early phase we work carefully to build trust between all four partners; Faith, WHES, the County Commission, and God. It is through those trusting relationships that the Holy Spirit works and God’s plan is unveiled. It is also through those trusting relationships that God’s story is shared!