I met Victor at youth court not long after I arrived at my first church. A friend called me in a panic because they needed a translator downtown for a youth court. The eleven-year-old was to be tried that night, and his father – who only spoke Spanish – was to be his witness. They thought it would be a good idea if someone other than Victor acted as translator.
Victor was accused of shooting a child in the leg with a BB gun. He claimed it was an accident and that he hadn’t run away from the scene as alleged. His father testified to his story’s truth. The jury pondered his motives and sincerity (I don’t think they liked Victor’s comment that the kid was a “pest”). In the end, Victor was given the maximum punishment by his peers: twenty-five hours of community service and four jury duties.
As I was explaining the verdict to his father, I discovered that they lived only three blocks from our church. Victor began his community service hours with at our church the next day.
Victor wears his pants low and adds a couple of chains around his neck for pizzazz. His hair is often spiked and didn’t even fall flat on those days when I put him upstairs to clean that awfully hot youth room. It would not be easy work. The youth room was dusty, full of Burger King bags and half-empty cans of pop. The ping-pong balls were cracked, the sofas musty, and the posters falling from the walls.
Victor assured me he could make a difference in this room. “But,” he asked, “are you sure this could be a room for us, me and my friends?”
It didn’t take Victor long to turn that musty room around. While cleaning he’d come across a large cross that he placed on a table in a way that resembled an altar. He then positioned the entire apparatus – altar and all – in front of the east window. He told me that he had considered many places for the cross, but that this seemed to be the most fitting. “This is a church isn’t it? Every church should have a cross in the window so those of us on the outside can see it.”
Victor had one more responsibility as my helper for those weeks. Vacation Bible School was on its way, and we needed some help with its organization and preparation. He wasn’t sure about any kind of “school” in the summer, but said he’d help in any way he could. We walked together to the post office one day and encountered some of his friends. “Hey,” he said, “you know that big church next to the school? I’ve been inside. It’s really kinda cool.” He proceeded to invite them to Bible School. Victor was becoming an evangelist.
Victor’s friends came to church for VBS, and our community was blessed by Javier, Pedro, and Fernando. About mid-week, Pedro came to me with a question, “Cynthia,” he said, “You know those…um…community service hours that Victor has? How can I get some of those?”
Do kids have to shoot the neighborhood pest with a BB gun before we let them into our churches? For Pedro, he knew that Victor had access to the church. He knew that Victor was spending his afternoons in a building with games, room to roam, and something to do – which for many urban kids is the best thing going – even if it is cleaning a dusty youth room! Pedro wanted access. He no longer wanted to be the one who saw the cross from the outside but rather from the inside.
There have been no more BB gun incidents, and Victor’s community service hours have turned out to be a boon to our youth program. Our youth room is now home to a fifteen-person youth group that meets weekly. Four-fifths of them are there because they are “friends of Victor.” Each of them traces their presence in our church back to his invitation. Now that is a Victor-y!
