Gather Your Community: Hear From A BJM Family
This year has been unimaginable, to say the least. Each of us has faced unique challenges, yet COVID has been a common denominator for us all. One family—who has played an integral role in our community for many years—has shared their COVID story in their own words for you to read. Enjoy this story of trial, triumph, and infinite imagination.
2020 has been challenging for everyone. Not a single person has gone unaffected by this global pandemic. Our family included. Like many, we lost our jobs. On top of that, our entire family contracted COVID. Being out of work and unable to leave our apartment, we weren’t sure how we were going to pay our bills. Because of San Francisco’s eviction moratorium, we weren’t going to be evicted immediately. But we needed to come up with the back-rent before long. We’ve been in that same apartment for more than a decade. San Francisco is our home. We love the city, and we love the Tenderloin. COVID threatened to uproot us, and we couldn’t imagine a way around it.
But we know that our God is a provider who works in unimaginable ways. Sometimes it’s through other people. Sometimes through organizations. Sometimes through miracles. We were believing for all three, and our BJM community believed with us.
Early on in shelter-in-place, BJM started a virtual prayer gathering for Tenderloin families. We’d worship and pray together every week. My husband and I emerged as the co-leaders, facilitating intercessory prayer and spontaneous song. We called it La Familia because we truly are a big family.
Families celebrate together, from small successes to big accomplishments. Families hurt together, from a crummy day of virtual school to a devastating loss. Families walk alongside one another by checking in, praying, and offering support when they can. Families are in it for the long haul, and families contend for miracles for one another.
After much prayer and encouragement from La Familia, God provided miracles. BJM supplemented some of our debts with money from the Brighter Futures Benevolence Fund, another organization in the city paid our rent, provided sick-pay, and delivered food to our door while we quarantined. We were even connected with a social worker who supported us through the illness. And shortly after we healed, my husband found a job at a restaurant.
If I’ve learned anything in 2020, it’s that God takes circumstances that are unimaginably hard and somehow works them for good. Everything feels so dark right now, but I know that my family’s future is bright because God says that it is. Would you dare to imagine with us? Visit bjm-imagine.funraise.org to join our community as we imagine together.