July 2026 Missions Update
THE TRAINER FAMILY - MISSIONARIES TO BROOKLYN NYC
Hello from the Trainers…
Welcome from the Trainer family - Stephen &Carrie, plus Ryan (16), Liam (13), Sean (10), Audrey (5), and Nathan (4)! We're missionaries making disciples in Brooklyn's Coney Island and Brownsville neighborhoods. These newsletters are our way of keeping you close to what God is doing here. Thank you for being part of this with us!
We lead Graffiti Ministries Brooklyn, and our ministry model is best described as “meet the need first,” coming alongside people with practical help like our free GED program. These acts of service and the relationships they bring allow people to see and hear the gospel.
GED Stories…
Our flagship ministry is a free GED program we offer in both Brooklyn communities we serve. Most of our neighbors don't have a high school diploma — nearly half in Coney Island, and closer to two-thirds in Brownsville. Through our Learning Center, we first meet the need by offering free GED classes with no age limits and no minimum reading level, because meeting people where they are is where everything starts. From the classroom, relationships grow into first steps of faith. Alpha courses, Bible studies, and house churches take our students from a practical need met to a life transformed by the gospel.
Paulette enrolled in our Coney Island GED at the beginning of this semester (January). She is originally from the Caribbean and immigrated to Brooklyn several years ago. Like many Caribbean ladies in NYC (and like Crystal, whom you met in our last newsletter), she works in the home health industry, providing in-home care to the sick and infirm.
Paulette has gone through a lot in the past few years, and she knows that a diploma is necessary for the future she wants for herself. She plugged into our GED program without hesitation and is always the first to arrive for class.
She has been a part of other programs in the past, but has never felt supported in the ways she needs, and as a result, her confidence has suffered over the years. After just a month as a student at Graffiti, I told her she was ready to go take the first of the four subject tests for her GED, she didn’t believe me! She just couldn’t understand how she was ready for the first exam so soon, after trying and failing so many times before.
I explained to her that she is in the driver’s seat and I won’t try and force her to take a test she doesn’t feel ready for. However, after more than a decade and over 1,000 GED students, I felt confident she was ready.
With that encouragement, she went for the first test, and passed! Then another - and then another! She has passed three of the four tests, and is scheduled to take her last test in about a week. By the time you read this, she should have her diploma!
Graffiti Partners on the Mission Field!
We have continued to host several mission teams from our partnering churches throughout this Spring and early summer. These short-term missionaries have joined in God’s ministry of reconciliation here in Brooklyn by being the hands and feet of Jesus! We met the need first and made the gospel available to our communities through servant evangelism projects, GED program outreach, and hundreds of volunteer hours through our school-based partnerships. We also fed the hungry, helped two families move, and served alongside community-based organizations to beautify the neighborhood!
Upside-down Evangelism…
One of our favorite ways to share our faith is through kindness outreach projects, what we are starting to call "upside down" evangelism. Last week we were blessed to host a mission team from Black Mountain, North Carolina, and we went out into the community to clean the bathrooms of stores along the avenue. We do this because we believe that cleaning bathrooms is the closest modern-day equivalent to Jesus' washing the disciples' feet, and it always leads to gospel conversations.
Two of the team members came to a cell-phone store and found the door locked. When the young man working came to the door, they explained that we were there to clean his bathroom to show him God's love in a practical way, and he had one of the most puzzled looks I've ever seen. He asked questions like, "Who sent you?" and "What is your motivation?", which they gladly answered. He said it was okay to clean the bathroom.
When the job was finished, he explained that he was a Muslim, and was just moving into that storefront. The previous tenant had left the place in pretty bad shape, and he said, "I was just praying to Allah that he would send me someone to help clean the bathroom and the stockroom, because I'm here by myself and I feel completely overwhelmed. Just a moment later, you came to the door and said you were here to clean the bathroom to show me that God sees me and loves me… I'm very interested to learn more about Jesus."
Biblical Community
At Graffiti Ministries Brooklyn, we are committed to “meet the need first,” but that never means meet the need only. Meeting needs in Jesus’ name builds relationships that, in turn, give us the trust and permission necessary to share the gospel, which is everyone’s greatest need! We are continuing to disciple new and growing believers in our communities through our “Graffiti Group” house churches, where our people find the kind of Biblical community we read about in Acts 2:42.
“All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.”
We need your help, so we can keep meeting the need first…
We LOVE these opportunities to tell you all about the radical life changes we continually see here in Brooklyn! Through outreach, education, and discipleship, people in some of the hardest parts of our nation’s largest city are finding hope and meeting Jesus.
It’s not nearly as fun to talk about the finances required, but the truth is, that is a big part of the reality as well. It would be impossible for us to serve our communities without you.
Did you know that Graffiti Ministries Brooklyn receives no denominational or missions agency funding?
Everything we do, every GED class, every Bible study, every meal shared around a table, happens because individuals, families, and churches choose to partner with us. That's it. There's no safety net and nothing behind the curtain.
Over the past two years, we've lost a significant number of monthly donors through normal life changes. This is perfectly natural as people face moves, job transitions, and new seasons of life. That's the reality of partnership-funded ministry: attrition is constant, and right now we're in a season where we need to rebuild.
We're praying for new monthly partners across these giving levels:
A lot of people feel that because they can’t give huge amounts, they can’t make a difference, but that’s not true at all!
The vast majority of our current partners give $100 a month or less, and every dollar goes directly to the work. If what you can give feels small to you, let us tell you — it isn't. God has a long track record of taking what we think is too little and multiplying it in ways we never saw coming. Any gift matters and together they make big life changes possible!
If you would like to become a new monthly (or one-time) partner, or renew your past partnership, you can find all the details on giving by card or check right here
Let’s Stay in Touch!
Thanks so much for taking the time to read this quarter’s ministry newsletter! We send these out just four times per year to avoid crowding your inbox, but we do have plenty to share in between as well. Please follow us on our socials below, and if you are not already, subscribe to this newsletter to make sure it lands in your inbox next quarter!
