DC of Tampa

Follow me on a little exploration of the great Dream Center of Tampa, an outreach of Grace Family Church.

As most Dream Centers are, this center is located smack dab in the middle of high crime, poverty, and need. But what makes this Dream Center unique and wonderful starts when you walk in.

COLORS!!! You can’t help but feel the inspiration, the potential, the joy!

When you walk in the doors you are greeted with bright turquoise, lime green, and inspirational art covering the walls of spaces made just for the youth of the community.

Keep going…down the hall is a gym for youth to … you know… get BUFF. Upstairs, the purple room is a new computer lab and library. The orange room for recreation. The pink room… for GIRLS only of course. The green room is an art room! The yellow room is a lounge filled with tables and restaurant booths given by Chick-Fil-A.

It’s like a heavenly mansion in there!

That doesn’t even scratch the surface of this place. From school clubs to nutrition programs to basketball leagues and on and on.

All of this has been created as a result of one vision. To reach the youth! A vision full of strategy. Like so many world changing places are coming to realize…youth are not only the gateway to changing the future but changing NOW. If you reach a child, you reach their family. If you reach a child, you reach into the future. If you reach a child, their hope spreads like a wildfire.

And that is what the Dream Center of Tampa aims to do. With three main focuses of community outreach, church, and mentorship they are doing just that.

In August, they are set to launch their church campus as a youth church. As the relationships with the kids are built a resulting relationship with the parents and grandparents will grow, opening a doorway to launch a full youth and adults campus.

Outreach is essential to keeping a pulse on the people in the community, from relationships to knowing needs to filling every corner with God’s presence.

And last but not least, mentorship. This is a GENIUS approach to investing in lives. It provides individual connections in deep way. It provides mentors with an opportunity to give of themselves, beyond what things or money can. It taps into a person’s gifts and talents and invites them to jump head first into the life of a child. Mentorship may not always be easy. But there’s something about that one-on-one connection that is incomparable.

None of this could be made possible without the love, time, energy, and passion of the amazing team there!

Ps. Ralph, Angela, Freddie, Mr. Ed, and everyone else there are TRUE HEROES!

There are so many amazing moments, people, thoughts that came from my time with Dad on this visit. But I guess if you want to know more, you’ll just have to go check it out for yourself!