Imagine a world where young Christians share faith and language together, fostering relationships across cultural and geographical boundaries. Hold that thought…It’s happening for real in our beloved Southend.
Southend Jesus Jam is the faith child of Kemi and Bright-Sam Dowokpor who moved to Southend from London 4 years ago and have developed a language and cultural exchange project for 10-18-year-olds from French-speaking countries. Kemi is the Founder of Mind Your Language International, a Social enterprise that operated in London teaching French to English children and youth through drama, music, cooking…and everything fun! She is a Nigerian born but lived and studied in France and is fully bilingual.
“Moving to Southend was a complete leap of faith for us as we knew no-one and had never even visited the town (yes, I know….after 15 years in London) before the Lord confirmed the move,” says Bright.
Kemi says ” For me I was concerned about keeping the vision of Mind Your Language alive as I understood that we were entering into a different community from Hackney were we received funding to run holiday language and art projects. The Lord helped us birth the vision of Jesus Jam which ran as a pilot project in Easter 2019 with Christian Youth from Impact Centre Chretien, Paris and Earl’s Hall Baptist Church.” The French students spent 5 days in Southend taking part in English through Christian drama projects, games, theatre tours, sporting activities, and London tours. The week ended with a bilingual worship, word, food and games night (Jesus Jam) at Earl’s Hall Baptist Church.
Feedback reached France and the Jesus Jam buzz began rippling through ICC. The 2020 vision is to intensify the language and cultural experience of our visitors by placing the children in Christian Host Families. Host families will receive a daily rate for each child and in turn provide a safe, homely and Christian environment for the duration of their stay ( usually 5-7 days during half terms but possibly longer in the summer)
If you would like to join us either as a host or volunteer youth or children’s worker we would love to hear from you. Save the date 17-21 February for the next Jesus Jam event.
Please visit our website www.mylinternational.com or Contact Kemi Dowokpor on 07961046616