A Letter from Jonny
I want to share a story with you. Several months ago a young man named Tim walked through our doors with his grandparents. He came to skate the park. Tim said he didn’t believe in God, but he tries to live right and do good to others. His family is a string of broken relationships. He doesn’t have many friends and is clearly crying out for attention and a place to belong. I can see Tim is hurt inside, but he puts on a good front. Smiles, jokes, swagger; its all a cover up. I have shared the gospel with him, skated with him, encouraged him, challenged him, prayed for him. Tim doesn’t follow Jesus yet, but he is here, coming in the doors of Help Board Shop, JSAW’s headquarters. He tells me that he loves coming here. I know that we don’t have the biggest or best skate park. We don’t have the largest selection of skateboards on the wall, but I know he feels God’s love in this place. He doesn’t know it yet, but that is what brings him back here. In the last 30 days we’ve had 129 different riders walk in the front door. I see 129 opportunities to introduce riders to Jesus and engage them in discipleship. Ding! No joke, another skater just walked in the door.
This year JSAW celebrated 10 years of action sports ministry. Since inception JSAW has shared the gospel with over 140,000 youth through events. Each of those are stories similar to Tim’s. In the last 3 months we’ve seen over 50 young people commit their lives to following Jesus. We have done action sports ministry in 11 different countries building skateparks and supporting leaders with micro grants. JSAW isn’t like other organizations that provide clean water, fight human trafficking, and alleviate hunger or poverty. JSAW serves a culture that is broken and unreached by anyone else. We aren’t a big organization and we need your support to keep reaching out to riders like Tim. As I sit here writing this, the skatepark is jam packed with skaters. Bible study starts in 20 minutes. Music is bumping over the speakers. I need to hire more staff, but we don’t have the funding. I am overwhelmed with the opportunities before us and I am praying God will move in the hearts of the people reading this to give generously this Christmas season. Hold on, I just received a text from a skater asking for prayer. As of today we need to raise $21,000 by December 31st to meet our budget for 2014. I need to go spend time with Tim and the rest of these dudes, so I will end here…
Please donate online at www.jsaw.org/donate or by mailing a check to ‘JSAW‘ at 7385 Bush Lake Rd., Edina, MN 55439.
Every dollar makes a difference. I will write another post in January to let you know how we did! Please share this post with your friends and encourage them to give too! If you have any questions please email me directly at jonnynelson@jsaw.org
Merry Christmas!