Editor’s Note: Over the next few months an occasional series called “Restoring Hope” will appear. The stories will highlight groups and individuals participating in the city’s recovery and sharing the Gospel in the process. Hopefully these stories will inspire others to find unique ways to make a difference in the “new” New Orleans.

Feb. 13, 2007

By Michael McCormack

NEW ORLEANS -- Many New Orleans streets are stuck in an endless winter. And it has nothing to do with the time of year.

The brown hues that are typical of winter instead bear witness to the difficult and slow recovery many New Orleanians face each day. For many streets, the colors of life are slow to return.

But a drive down a growing number of New Orleans area streets offers passersby a vibrant and hopeful sign of life – a new playground built by Kids Around the World (KATW).

For 12 years, Kids Around the World, a Christian organization based in Rockford, Ill., has been building playgrounds literally “around the world.” In those 12 years, KATW has built almost 80 playgrounds. A glance at Kids Around the World’s 2007 schedule reveals the worldwide impact it has, with upcoming sites in the Dominican Republic, the Bahamas, Vietnam, Bosnia, Sri Lanka and India.

And while countries jump at the chance to host Kids Around the World, building playgrounds is just half of what the group does. KATW uses flannel graphs – felt cloth decorated with different biblical characters and scenes – at every stop to make sure that local Christians will be able to effectively teach children Bible stories.

“While we build the playground, we’ll have another group that will train the local Sunday school teachers and pastors to tell Bible stories [with the flannel graph],” Playground Director Jerry Flaming said. “They know the stories. It’s a matter of telling them how to use the characters to tell the stories of the Bible.”

So far, KATW has trained more than 7,000 people worldwide to teach the Bible using the colorful characters floating on felt. Teaming playgrounds with flannel graphs continues to ensure that kids can both enjoy being kids and hear the gospel while they’re young.

“Those are the two halves,” Flaming said. “The playground is what gets us in, but the backbone of the company is changing kids’ lives.”

Responding to disaster at home

Although the majority of playgrounds built by Kids Around the World are in countries other than the United States, the group was fast to help in the Gulf Coast’s recovery after Hurricane Katrina.

According to KATW’s December 2005 newsletter, the organization is “committed to providing the hope to children around the world as they go through tragedies. … When this happens at home in the United States, we respond just the same.”

Kids Around the World initially responded to Hurricane Katrina by putting Bibles into the hands of hundreds of Sunday School teachers across the Gulf Coast. Soon thereafter, and thanks to a partnership with Samaritan’s Purse, Kids Around the World was able to begin building playgrounds throughout the storm-ravaged region.

“The partnership started out as Franklin Graham [president of Samaritan’s Purse] wanting to give a gift to the children returning after the flood,” David Headley, project coordinator for KATW, said. “From there, he contacted Kids Around the World to come down and look at some potential playground areas.”

With Samaritan’s Purse’s support, Kids Around the World initially planned to build five playgrounds along the Gulf Coast. It wasn’t long before the partnership blossomed into something more.

“By the time it’s all said and done, we’ll end up doing almost 20 playgrounds in Mississippi and Louisiana,” Flaming said.

Many of those playgrounds serve to bolster churches that are struggling to recover from the storm.

“We all know that things aren’t going the best right now,” Flaming said. “The churches were flooded and the congregations are half gone. The playground gives them new life and something to draw people to the church.”

The playground given to Gentilly/Elysian Fields Ave. Baptist Church has done just that.

Both churches were severely damaged in the storm. Gentilly Baptist Church received about 7 ft. of floodwater and had to tear down a house next door that was owned by the church. The building where Elysian Fields Ave. Baptist Church met had to be completely torn down.

Now, the combined congregations, led by Ken Taylor, the longtime pastor of Elysian Fields Ave. Baptist Church, are seeking to use the playground to bring much-needed life back into that part of the Gentilly community. To introduce the new playground to the neighborhood, the church hosted a block party just after the playground was completed last December.

“The block party we had showed the hunger in the community for positive activities for children,” Taylor said. “Having the playground will provide a permanent positive outreach to the people in the neighborhood who lost so much. My prayer is that the playground will fit into a new ministry of outreach to our community.”

The playgrounds provided by Kids Around the World are more than just places for children to play. They’re ways for churches to help neighbors move through recovery to normalcy. The playgrounds offer an additional way for churches to embrace neighbors and have a lasting impact on kids’ lives.

Playground Director Jerry Flaming said that’s the ultimate meaning of the organization’s slogan “Playing for Keeps.”

“We’re playing to make sure a kid’s life is changed for good,” he said. “That’s the backbone of ‘Playing for Keeps.’ That’s why we do what we do.”

How you can help
Kids Around the World has a few more playgrounds to build in both New Orleans and Mississippi. Those interested in volunteering with KATW on a playground project may contact Jerry Flaming at jerry@kidsaroundtheworld.com or by phone at 815.229.8731. For more information, go online to www.kidsaroundtheworld.com.