Since 2008 the Teen Life Center has worked tirelessly to share the love of Christ and to help young single moms be the best moms they can be. Now as they continue to support teens in crisis pregnancy, TLC is broadening the mission to Two Lives Matter, expanding its role to provide material and spiritual support to single moms 19 to 25 and to offer a housing option for single moms 18 to 29. Join host Pastor David Schultz as he welcomes TLC Director Jennifer Simpson to the Engaging Truth microphone.

The following program is sponsored by evangelical life

Ministries. Welcome to engaging truth, the manifestation of God's word and the lives of people around us. Join us each week. As we explore the impact of his message of spiritual renewal from the lesson of forgiveness Fords in the crucible of divorce, to the message of salvation, learn earned by an executioner from a condemned killer to the gift of freedom found in the rescue of victims of human trafficking. This is God's truth in action. Welcome

To engaging truth. This is Dave Schulz, your host for this evenings program. I have a guest, uh, to be interviewed this evening, who has been with us many times if for her name is familiar to our audience, her name is Jennifer Simpson, and Jennifer has an organization called the teen life center, but it's changing. And we're gonna talk about that change in just a minute, but first of all, I wanna welcome Jennifer to the mic. Thank

You very much.

We've had this opportunity before, cause Jennifer works and has the word life in the middle of her name in other words, so important is life in the giving of life, the bearing of life and the living with life so important. She has an organization. She helps with young women. Uh, and she's gonna talk about that for just a minute. First of all, let's talk about your old organization. I don't mean old in the sense of old, but, but you are, you are taking a step up and calling it something else. Talk about that. Yes,

Teen life center w is changing and restructuring, but it, the heart of teen life center will not change. And what that is, is just creating a positive community that courages and supports young families. So teen life center helps young families, 21 and under, and the reason we have life in our name is because we help teens that chose life. We feel a great responsibility to a young mom that does choose life, because we all know that she has a choice. And if she chooses to bring a child into this world, don't we have the responsibility to help her do. So how

Is now the, the organization that you have supported or been supported for so long, and that you've used to help teen moms? How is that gonna change very quickly or very near in the very near future? Well, you know,

Pastor Schultz teen life center does a great work, but we both know that moms need our help that are over the age of 21. In fact, it's very common for us to see a 22 or a 23 year old through one of our diaper drives during COVID or even through our Facebook post of, Hey, I need help. I'm really struggling. I don't have a job. My unemployment stopped. I need diapers and wives. And so it's really dawned on us that there's a lot of people that need help, that just don't fit the teen life center criteria. So we actually have been praying a lot during COVID to make a change. And that change is creating an, an overarching umbrella organization called two lives change, which still has the word life in it. And very much has the two in it cuz the mom and the baby.

So we're going to be creating that organization very soon in the next couple weeks. And under that teen life center will still run as you know it with our five support centers in the areas of, of Rosenberg, Klein, Brookshire, San Antonio and, um, Cypress. But it will also start to house moms, single moms ages 18 to 29, which is such a need in our community for women that don't have anywhere to go to actually go. And also there will be a third, uh, organization started called kaleidoscope, which most people don't know, kaleidoscope is a group of butterflies. And if you know us, the, and you know, our logo is a butterfly. And so we're starting this, this group of kaleidoscope that will run much like teen life center, but will help women 22 to 25. So we are really expanding our reach and what we do

Help me walk through, um, a discussion on what happens when the door opens to your organization. And a woman comes in desperate in her situation, tell us in the listening audience, what you do to help her initially and what the process along the

Way to help. Well, each of our support centers at teen life center have a weekly meeting that they start usually around six o'clock with dinner. So a young mom would walk in. She be very nervous. It would be very awkward because she's probably been judged most of her life, but she would walk into a warm, inviting place and she would sit down and have dinner. And these dinners are home cooked meals. Usually sometimes we have to order pizza, but usually our community donates our dinners and she sits down and has dinner before she, she even takes a bite. We've already stood up and prayed as a group. And then she'll sit down, have dinner and get to know other moms and volunteers in the room. And after dinner, then we start a discussion or an activity or something that we have planned for that night.

And that can be anything from budgeting to toxic relationships, to vision boards. We do all kinds of that throughout the year, as long as, as well as excuse me, Bible studies too. So she'll meet with us for about an hour and a half doing whatever activity we have planned that night. And then at the end of the meeting, she'll get diapers and wipes. She'll be asked what her prayer requests are and she'll be prayed for. And then she'll go home with those, with those goodies. But think one of the biggest things that our ministry does that we don't talk a lot about is something that we call mid mid-week check-ins and it's something we just kind of start in the last year or two, where during the week we check in with each girl like a phone call, yes. Or a text or a Facebook message, but just how are you doing? And if we, their prayer request, we might ask directly about that prayer request. And we have found in our evaluations that those mean a whole lot to our girls. And it's just a simple five minute responsibility on our part. So that will, that will also happen for the new girl. And then of course, you'll be invited in, invited back into the meetings week after week. That's

A very basis of all of this is just, you're thinking that little one that has been brought into the world, didn't ask to be brought into the world. It didn't ask to be treated, um, uh, in a very officious way. Talk about that a little bit. This, the responsibility that we have, that you have, that, that all of us in the listening audience have with those families and those children, you know,

I get asked a lot. Why do you work at teen life center? I was not a teen mom myself. And my standard answer is because God said to, but I think deep down, what really drove me is that I had a daughter. My very first daughter was a huge responsibility and it was a little life that I had to, to bring up in this world. And I started the ministry when she was only one. And I think the motor motivation to help young moms was that I was a young mom, myself, not a teen mom, but a mom who didn't really know what I was doing and who questioned a lot of what I was doing, cuz it was all new. And there's, there's a big motivation to help other moms be the best mom they can be. Because those children, like you said, did not ask to be born.

They did asked to struggle or be hungry or be sad or be hurt. And I feel like we have a responsibility to sta to shoulder up with those moms and stand beside them and help them become the best moms they can be. You know, a lot of our moms that we serve have don't really know what it means to walk with Christ. They, they think they know, know that it, what it means to be a Christian, but they don't go to church and they don't know what it means to pray every day or do devotionals. And that's been a big part of what we do. And that's actually just like the midweek check-ins you know what, the second most popular thing we do is Bible study. And it blows my mind because I know you probably know too, that this generation is the furthest generation from church, but they're not the furthest generation from God. They're hungry for God. And that motivates me even more to share Christ because why else would I be running a teen pregnancy organization except for God. I mean, he led me there. I didn't go through it myself. So God just this immense grace and mercy and calling our lives. And I just wanna share that with young women, no matter where they come from or, or you know, what they want, they're usually if they come through our doors, they are hungry for some kind of support and 99% of the time it's for God.

What's so interesting in our conversation is that life for them has come from somewhere. It didn't just appear in a vacuum. Somebody had to plant a seed somewhere. Someone had to say something to them, God must have lit a little light lantern in someone's life to let the light shine into their life that they would come to you and, and not even be considering of abortion. But, but considering that this is a gift of God. I, I guess it amazes you too, doesn't it? I mean, when, when you consider all these things,

I, yes, because I think that, you know, being an adult and older now, I, I tend to think like, you know, the baby should have been placed for adoption. There's families out there that want children. I myself struggle with infertility. I know what that's like, but you know what? These babies grow these mamas up, they come into their lives and they change them. Many times a mom will be headed down a very dark road, maybe partying or drinking or with the wrong kind of guys or friends. And this baby will just change her life because babies need help. They need to be taken care of. They are not self-sufficient. And so I started thinking that, you know, for many people, adoption may be the answer, but not for everyone. And sometimes parenting is the best choice for a young mom.

I was thinking of an illustration that I heard some years ago with, with his little boy was walking down the beach with his father. And he saw these starfish that had come from the water on the beach. And uh, every once in a while he was stop and throw one back the water and his father said, well, why are you doing that? He said, well, this one needs to go back into the water. This one needs help. Well, they all do. But the boy made the choice, uh, to, uh, to, to place that one back into the water where it belongs, where it can live more successfully. I'm thinking about these girls and, um, they end up after they have had gospel readings with you in prayer time and meal. And the feeling of being wanted, uh, which may not have been true in their, in their home from which they came. But when they go back a changed person, does that affect the family from which she came as well?

You know, I don't know that we always find that out. It's always our hope that maybe that young mom is a spoke in the hub. And I think that down the road that probably does make a difference. Usually the girls are with us for about two years, and I don't know that we see a whole lot of difference in her family's life, but it's okay because we're planting a seed or maybe we're watering the seed, or maybe we're tending the garden. We have a part in her spiritual walk and we don't always know what part that is, but we just pray that it's a big part and that she can continue to disciple others. That's what we're called to do, make disciples. And so we teach our girls once they've accepted Jesus. And once they understand what that means, then they can start working with others. And maybe it's their mom, maybe it's their, their brother or somebody in their family. Maybe it's the father of the baby. So we just kind of leave that work up to God, never really knowing what's gonna happen, but certainly praying for it to happen.

It's really exciting that you see the proclamation of the message to these women as being equally as important as, or more important than even caring for them. Um, it's a gospel alone. That alone is changed into people's lives. How that happens is far beyond our ability to comprehend, but we do know the holy spirit makes that happen and he cultivates the soil, uh, of the heart to be able to, to receive that. Um, I know that there are people who have come to you and a, the struggle that this woman has had in the caring for this child is incredible. And yet, you know, that you may never see that person on this earth again, but because of the proclamation of the simple message, you'll see that person in heaven and, and how joy for that is to know that heaven is our real home. This is just a, an abiding place for a week and a half. Let me just talk a little, just for a moment about this organization that we support. And then at the end of this time, we're gonna talk about fun development, uh, for you.

Have you got a minute? Let me just share with you a little bit about this organization called Elm and the program that we are now recording for podcast distribution. We are a small group of Christ centered folks who believe in the power of communication. It has been for many of us on the board or of a wonderful, but an eye open experience to know with the technology available today, program such as this can be disseminated electron electronically and be distributed worldwide, almost instantaneously. And I don't believe that technology's gonna end because it's just, it's in road into our lives today. And that's why we are pausing for just a moment to ask you to pray for us and to support us as well. What is this organization called? Evangelical life ministries? Our PO boxes 5 6, 8, Cypress, Texas, 77, 410. And our website is Elm houston.org. You can go there and find every program that we've ever had for years, even ones that we have done with Jennifer before. So may we ask you, as we've talked to Jennifer about supporting what she does with the teen life center, does it happen once in a while that there are two girls that come from the same family? Oh yes.

Sisters come, um, often together, which is kind of mind blowing, but you know, when one girl comes and realizes that we're kind of a warm, inviting place, why wouldn't she invite her sister to? But yes, we have, um, two sisters right now in our organization and one of our centers,

I think that's exciting that, that the one of them who found out about you invited her sister and they both become amenable to what is happening. The greatest thing of course is the, the proclamation of the gospel itself. Yes. I want to do something now, Jennifer, that we talked about doing initially, and that is that, um, you don't live in a vacuum. Yeah. You don't live by yourself. You don't just go outside and wait for, or some kind of spiritual manner to fall from heaven. Um, what we do do is just simply talk to people about the support that could be had and could be received by you and your organization and what you support and what you do for the love of Christ. Talk about the support and needed for not only the teen life center, but the umbrella organization as well.

Yeah. So teen life center is unique in that it has run for the last 12 years on the generosity of others, much like you and me, just individuals and churches. We don't receive any government grants. And only recently have a re received foundation grant. We have been able to open many centers, four in the last two and a half years because of churches and individuals, but with COVID those individuals and churches, donations are a little bit down because people just don't have the same income that they did a year ago. So we need more individuals to sign up for recurring donations, to keep our five centers and areas of support afloat, but we feel the call to start more. We feel like teen life center has so much to give, but such a limited population and we need to help more people and we have a building to do it.

So we're asking directly today for support for the Chrysalis program, which is that residential program for St single moms 18 to 29. There are not very many programs in Texas where a young single mom can go and, and receive the help that we can give, including the gospel. And so we need money to do so. It's about $4,000 and that that's not even any kind of mortgage or rent because the building is free, but just a fee, the girls and, you know, pay for the light bill and the internet and any materials we might need. We need to raise the funds so we can help girls. Right now. We're only able to help two girls starting in January, but once the funds come in, we can increase that to four girls. And when we, when we feel established with four girls, then we'll open it full capacity with seven girls, imagine that a room for seven people in a nearly brand new building where they can learn about Jesus and feel safe doing so, you know, we serve a lot of girls at couch hop, or I believe the term is couch surf.

And that just means they don't have a stable place to go. That literally they are looking for the next couch to crash on, but with a child. And what kind of life is it for a six month or a one yearold to sleep on a couch or on the floor or in a pack and play it. It's just not the kind of life you would want for any child. And so it drives us to get this program up and running and all we need right now are prayers and support to do so. So we continue to open up at full capacity, which is seven girls.

I wanna say, um, Jennifer, that the dollars to support what any ministry, uh, needs are there in the community. What makes a difference is when the hearts of people who love the Lord, Jesus Christ, uh, hear the message. They hear the heart rending message. They hear the grateful message. They, they hear the enthusiastic message of what is happening and say, that is something that I can help with. Um, I'm always amazed when, um, even as an organization such as ours, uh, we receive gifts from people that we don't know. And it's, it's exciting because what happens somewhere along the line, um, of life, somebody has said something that has encouraged them and spoken to their hearts and they have responded accordingly. Talk a little bit about what happens when that, that hurting mom walks through the front door. She has no idea what you can do other than she's heard that help is here. Tell us how you think about her to begin with how you help her to understand what you do and also funding

Of it. You know, I think that probably half of our girls come to one of our centers needing diapers and wipes, and that is that's okay, because that is a physical need to survive with a baby. And if that, what that's, what gets them in the door, then it was all worth it. Because once they get into the door, they receive so much more than diapers and wipes that sometimes we ever forget to give out diapers and wipes. And occasionally nobody will even say a word. So we know that once they come in the door and they feel the warmness and nonjudgment, and just the encouragement that we, we are very, very, it's very important to us that our, our meetings are encouraging and not judgemental. And we they're, God filled they're spirit filled. You know, we pray before dinner, we pray at the end of the night, we ask them how they're doing.

We lift up everything to, to the Lord, good things and challenging things. And in fact, we started our last couple meetings last year with this concept of tell us what's going good in your life and tell us what's challenging. And then we turned around and we said, those are the praises for God and their prayer request for God. And it really built a beautiful prayer list for God. And as we lift them up, you can just see God at work. You, I mean, you can just see a piece that surpasses all understanding with these girls. They don't even know that's what they needed. When they walked in the door, they thought they needed diapers and wipes, but they quit. They just needed Jesus. And they needed people who care and aren't judging their every movement. So, you know, it, it's not free to have centers.

It's not always free. The dinners are not always covered by the community. The diapers are not always donated, but they're always available. So we have to make sure that we have of funds to keep the lights on, to keep the diapers stocked, to keep the wipes stocked. And also, we, I don't know. A lot of people don't realize that we offer a lot of counseling. Um, it's expensive to get a professional counselor to work with you, and they're not gonna donate all of their time. They may discount their services, but we always have to pay for counseling. And it's a blessing to do so because when you have an outside individual that has been schooled in Christian counseling, that is only gonna be beneficial to our young mom. And so we need the funds for that. So, you know, as much as I would love to say everything is, is donated and everything is accounted foreign, we never need money. It's just not true. It, we need money so we can help girls. And COVID has really opened the doors to more need, but less money. So it's kind of a predicament, but we know that our God is good. And just like you said, we don't always know who the gifts come from. The same is true for us. God pulls the heart strings. He knows the donors, and he just tells 'em where to donate their money. And it's really a beautiful thing. Let's

Say there's a lady or there's a man who's been heart touched by your message today. How do they write, uh, an envelope with your address on it, to send a check? What would be that address? So

The easiest way to donate to us, there's actually two ways you can send a check in the mail. And our, our, um, address is teen life center. And it's PO box 1 94 in Brookshire, Texas 77, 4 23. And if you wanna do so electronically, then you can just visit our website, which is WW, do dot the teen life center.com. So it's our name teen life center with the word, the in front of it. And you can Google teen life center and it'll pull up quickly. And there's a little black button that says donate right at the top. We've tried to make it as easy as we can. So the funds come in so we can help the young families.

I wanna say, thank you, Jim. And for this have been an easy interview simply because of the fact that you're so positive, uh, and that positivity doesn't come just by nature. It comes because you know, Jesus and you know what he has done for you and all so many moms before. So if you are in the listening audience, please, please consider this moment at this time to sit down and write a note to Jennifer and send a check, a large check, maybe tens of thousands of dollars, maybe a small check, but send it nonetheless. I wanna say thank you for listening. Be with us again next Sunday night, as we explore engaging truths, goodnight, and come see us again.

Thank you for listening to this broadcast of engaging truth. Be sure to join us each week at this time to help support our ministry, contact evangelical life ministries, post office box 5 68, Cypress, Texas 77, 410, or visit our website@elmhouston.org, or find us on Facebook evangelical life ministries. Thank you.