Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Craven.
Michael, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
BridgeBuilders began serving the poor in South Dallas over 22-years-ago. I was enlisted to take over the organization in 2014 following the premature death of its founder, Mike Fechner. As a theologian, businessman, and student of social and cultural formation, I was faced with the challenge and opportunity to re-vision the organization and seek solutions to actually solving the problem of generational poverty that, today, plagues our city. After three years of rigorous research and serious analysis, we have developed one of the most innovative poverty-alleviation organizations in the country. We are seeing the cycle of poverty broken within a single generation and teaching others around the country how to do the same.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
It has been an incredibly difficult process given the deeply entrenched values and conditions that enslave the poor to a culture and mindset that renders it nearly impossible for them to flourish without help. In addition, the “charity industry” stands as a major obstacle to helping people gain independence and restore their dignity. We, as a nation, have to completely rethink how we understand poverty and seek to truly help the poor among us.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
BridgeBuilders is making poverty history by addressing the spiritual, cultural and material conditions that foster and sustain urban poverty. This holistic approach begins with resident missionaries bringing the Gospel into inner-city communities that suffer from extreme spiritual, social and cultural brokenness. These efforts are then followed by an array of practical services aimed at overcoming the many material barriers to flourishing that those trapped in poverty face such as family dissolution, felony backgrounds, un-employability, inadequate credentials, limited education, restricted transportation and diminished life skills. We do this through a three-pronged focus: a MISSIONS strategy to save, KIDS programs to protect, and WORK training to restore.
Together, these programs serve to restore the four broken relationships essential to human flourishing: with God, self, others, and creation.
This comprehensive approach is proving successful in breaking the cycle of generational poverty that is growing in the U.S. thereby saving a new generation from experiencing family breakdown, dependency and despair.
What were you like growing up?
Like many of those that we serve, I came from a broken home, which adversely impacted me during my teenage years. This dysfunctional origin leads me to make many poor decisions until my conversion at the age of twenty-one. As a result, I have a great deal of empathy for those who have suffered far worse and find their lives wrecked by extreme social and cultural dysfunction.
I served in the US Navy and went on to achieve a successful business career as the CEO of a German-based manufacturing company until leaving my corporate career to serve in vocational ministry in 2001.
I am happily married (27 years) with three beautiful children, Tyler (26), Catherine (23), and Maddie (19).
I am an avid cyclist and own a sick Harley!
Contact Info:
- Address: 2075 W. Commerce St.,
Dallas, TX 75208 - Website: www.hisbridgebuilders.org
- Phone: 469-621-5940
- Email: mcraven@hisbridgebuilders.org
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/smichaelcraven?ref=tn_tnmn
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/sMichaelCraven
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