InnerCHANGE Modesto

We are a family of 6 on mission together. As a couple we have been ministering together since 2008. We have 4 sons and we are currently living and serving in Modesto, CA.

Here is a bit of our backstory. We served under local leadership with InnerChange San Dimas in San Francisco where we ministered at the local juvenile hall, helped to create community for gang affiliated youth who were exiting jail and lived in transitional housing for Spanish speaking youth from Latin America.

In September 2009, our team in San Francisco began to feel God putting the city of Oakland on our heart. Youth that we had known in San Francisco were living in Oakland and others were migrating to Oakland due to the rising cost of living in San Francisco. The youth invited us to come and live close to them. After a year of prayer and discernment, we felt God confirming the invitation to start a team there. The Oakland InnerChange team partnered with a local Spanish speaking church to offer English (ESL) classes. We continued ministering to young people who were incarcerated through Bible studies, prayer, personal visits, court accompaniment, & supporting families of inmates. With God’s help we built community with youth & families by inviting them into our lives and what we love. We prayed, did scripture study, & shared meals and invited them into nature. We did an annual camping & white water rafting trip, cooked out in parks, played soccer and went hiking and swimming.

In 2020 when Covid hit, most of our ministry activities were shut down. Many people we knew were leaving Oakland and the Bay Area for the valley of California. As we prayed about next steps for us as a family we began to see God’s invitation to Modesto, CA.

We arrived in Modesto in March 2022 and are asking God to build a diverse team that reflects the city. We are currently leading a missional community through a local church plant. We have begun exploring the city and are networking different ministries and organizations. We joined a community garden. We are asking God to show us his heart for Modesto and how we can tangibly serve and love the city. If you have a heart for those on the margins of Modesto please pray about joining us!

Modesto Team Mission:

• We seek to be humble disciples who sit at Jesus' feet.

• We pray for the Holy Spirit to fill us and empower us with God’s love.

• We learn from our neighbors and community by listening to them.

• We repent and lament and acknowledge the brokenness, violence and sin that separates us from God and others.

• We pursue opportunities to build relationships and community.

• We are ministers of reconciliation.

• We promote justice, mercy, and compassion for our friends who are often poor, marginalized, and discriminated against.

• We tell the stories of those who cannot speak up for themselves and in so doing find ourselves sharing God’s heart and story.

• We celebrate whenever we see God transforming a life!

• We share the Good news of Jesus and invite others to follow Him!