Small miracle sprouted from good soil - revisited

I first wrote this web article in 2007. However with newspapers going out of business and servers being terminated, I was concerned that this story of a wonderful town and its people would fade into obscurity. So I have brought it back again to live another day.

Good Shepherd Alliance (GSA) Partnered with Local Government, Churches, Individuals, Businesses, and Civic Groups

The founding of Mary’s House of Hope is an example of a total and loving community effort. This is the story of a mustard seed being planted here in good soil and the community is good soil. The GSA in partnership with the Town, some HUD Community Development Block Grants administered by Loudoun County Department of Family Services and extraordinary acts of kindness from the community dedicated a house for homeless pregnant women on 12 May 2007. Mary’s House of Hope was designed exclusively for pregnant women or women with newborns by architect Tom O’ Neil of Leesburg and the general contractor was Bob Bryner of B&B Construction in Lovettsville who supervised the project. The dedication ceremony just may have been Loudoun County’s finest hour. This benevolence has since touched the lives of a number of homeless female guests and their newborns.

In 2004 Joy Trickett and I, GSA Board Members for a nonprofit organization that provides emergency housing and support for the homeless in Loudoun, attended Town Council meetings at each township in the county asking for a donation of a building that could be used to house the homeless or support homeless programs. The mayor and council responded. The town offered GSA a long-term, $1 lease on an abandoned 100-year-old frame house. It was a dilapidated, two-bedroom relic of the towns past. Although I was rather tentative, Joy Trickett immediately got the ball rolling to determine if this old house could replace the Jeremiah's House Ministry, for unwed mothers in Paeonian Springs. That important nonprofit had closed its doors leaving no shelter facility in the county dedicated to the needs of homeless pregnant women.

In 2005 the Town did lease the house to The GSA with the stipulation that GSA would restore and operate the facility using funding received from its own programs. The GSA decided to build Mary’s House of Hope to provide transitional shelter, counseling, education, love and support to homeless pregnant women living in crisis. The House for Women would be the only facility of its kind in Loudoun County, housing three women and their babies and serve as a community beacon where local folks could volunteer to assist women in need under the management of the GSA.

In June 2006, Ms. Jane Burnett, a Real Estate Appraiser in Leesburg and a mother of three children agreed to voluntarily coordinate much of the donor efforts of labor, time and materials to support the General Contractor in the construction of this enormous effort. Using her extensive contacts in Western Loudoun Ms. Burnett began to solicit donations from the business and resident community. However she first had to meet with the building architect and general contractor to ascertain what was approved by the Town Architectural Design Review Board. Ms. Burnett established partnerships in the community with vendors, building contractors, civic organizations and area Churches to complete this special undertaking. GSA had approximately 75% of the funding to complete this endeavor. Another $60,000.00 in material and labor was needed to be solicited from the community.

Ms. Burnett coordinated the project from its initial phase through the rough-in, middle construction and final phase. The period of performance for this effort took place from June of 2006 when the general contractor was determined, through groundbreaking on 4 November 2006 to the dedication ceremony on 12 May 2007. She was able to successfully coordinate with the general contractor’s work schedule and solicit vendors and contractors from Loudoun, Prince William, Fairfax and Culpepper counties, and Arlington and Alexandria. Some vendors who supported this effort were as far away as Maryland, Pennsylvania and New York. The deliveries of material and scheduled volunteer efforts had to be intensely managed so as not to conflict with the general contractor’s major completion milestones and delivery schedules.

During this entire effort, Ms. Burnett provided the Town Council with monthly progress updates. She often used the Council meetings as a platform to inform the local community of the construction status and requested specific assistance for those items and skilled labor in which GSA was in dire need. She accepted interviews with Loudoun cable television and county radio news programs and spoke periodically to staff writers from local newspapers getting out the message as to what was currently required to complete a particular construction phase.

Over an eleven month period, Ms. Burnett volunteered several hundred hours to complete this extraordinary mission. Without her extensive knowledge and experience GSA would not have been able to manage the complex issues of interweaving volunteers with the general contractor’s paid construction workers through the various stages of production. Ms. Burnett was able to generate an incredible amount of enthusiasm and support in northern Virginia. These acts of kindness exhibited from the community were exceptional and were gratefully received by the GSA Board of Directors, staff and homeless residents.

Jane Burnett has a special place in her heart for the women that reside here. She believes women who come here may have made a bad choice, or maybe a good one. They can come here, a safe haven to receive help and more importantly support. Doctors and nurses in the area have volunteered. Neighbors offer to drive the women to jobs or appointments.

Case managers implement crisis intervention through education, goal setting, and stress management and job training. They all work toward independence and self-sufficiency. At Mary's House of Hope mothers receive support and resources necessary to help prevent a cycle of homelessness that can pass on to the next generation. The women receive pre- and post-partum support such as prenatal care, lactation consulting, parenting classes and the consistency of a safe home for up to two years.

May 12, 2007 Keynote Address at Dedication Ceremony

Mike Emerson

Assistant Pastor

Cornerstone Chapel

Leesburg, Virginia

It is my distinct privilege to be here with you today to celebrate the dedication of Mary’s House of Hope.

Except for the fact that we do not have a large crowd this morning; today’s ceremony reminds me of the dedication of the Gettysburg national cemetery in November 1863. I would like to point out that I will not duplicate the length of the keynote speaker that day, former Senator Edward Everett, whose 13,607 words required two hours to deliver. Everett finally yielded the platform to Lincoln, whose stated desire was to deliver “a few appropriate remarks.”

Lincoln’s speech was just nine sentences long, and it took only about two minutes to read. He remarked that, “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.”

And so it is with this dedication. The citizens of Loudoun County, much less the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia, may never hear about this home, and even though some will, they may forget and “will little note” the purpose for this home or why we’re here today.

We’re here to give thanks to the Lord because he brought about the partnership of Good Shepherd Alliance, local government, churches, individuals, businesses, and civic groups, which is a rare combination in our day, to unite together to make an incredible statement to the people of Loudoun County, regarding the value of life and the worth of every person in our community.

We’re here to celebrate the dedication of this home, which will be a visible testimony to everyone, that people who have chosen to be difference-makers have come together to declare their belief in the fact that women and their unborn children are loved and are precious to the Lord.

What is said here today, as Lincoln noted, will most likely not be “long remembered." However, those who come to live here because they are in a time of crisis will find that this home is as advertised – a place of hope. The women who give birth to a child, learn what it means to be a godly mother, who receive training in parenting skills, who receive encouragement from God’s Word through the ministry of Christians in our community; these women and their children will never forget the life-changing impact of Mary’s House of Hope. It will also be “long remembered” by those who come to minister in this home because they will never forget the Lord’s blessing for being obedient to his call to love and serve others as Jesus did.

May we never forget this place, which is a beacon of hope in a troubled world. Let us pledge ourselves to be a part of its ongoing ministry by praying for and serving with the ministry of the Good Shepherd Alliance.

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