In Doug Congleton’s woodworking shop, the life-changing influence one person can have on another reveals itself as a block of castoff junk wood is turned into a thing of beauty.

Uncovering

Beauty

Within

oug Congleton pauses for a few moments outside his home woodworking shop in Battle Ground, Washington. He catches the sweet, subtle fragrance of Douglas fir trees and the melodic chirrups of birds playing in the branches overhead. Time slows. Moments like these, connecting with nature, aren’t to be rushed. For Doug, they bring a renewed sense of life and purpose.

Turning, he enters his shop. The work area isn’t large, but something profoundly meaningful happens here. It starts in a pile of castoff junk wood—leftovers from a cabinetmaker’s shop. “You really want those good-for-nothing cutoffs?” the cabinetmaker had asked. “If you have a use for them, they’re yours for the taking. Otherwise, they’ll end up in the dumpster.”

Now, months later, Doug reaches into the pile. Picking out a bruised and discarded chunk, he knows there’s a secret waiting inside. First, he cuts the wood to size—six inches long by three-quarters of an inch square. After drilling through the center of the entire length, Doug carefully positions the piece of wood in his lathe and locks it into place.

Donning eye and ear protection, he flips the switch and gently touches the rapidly spinning wood block with a sharp metal tool. As Doug carefully moves his tool back and forth along the spinning block, it changes shape. Sharp, rough, battered edges turn into sawdust and disappear, along with the outside dings and other imperfections.

As the imperfections vanish, a rich burgundy serpentine grain emerges, and the wood almost miraculously snaps to life. Soon the piece is completely round along its length. Over the course of 45 minutes, Doug continues to shape it—a little thinner here, a little thicker there. In gentle expert hands, what had been considered worthless has turned into a beautiful wood pen.

The project nears completion as Doug holds increasingly fine grits of sandpaper to the wood’s turning surface. Then he cleans the surface and applies a clear coat finish, which he also sands with an extremely fine-grit paper. Now the pen’s exterior is silky smooth, and the beauty of the grain glows beneath a satin sheen. He assembles the remaining items, and it’s an exquisitely rendered work of art—a writing instrument that tells a story of hidden beauty.

Throughout his career, Doug has had the privilege of seeing a similar story play out in the lives of hundreds of orphaned and abandoned children around the world.

 

TROUBLED CHILDHOOD

The youngest of four siblings, Doug was born in California in the late 1950s. His parents divorced while he was very young. “We were raised in Ventura, California, by our grandparents,” Doug recalls.

The early years were difficult, dysfunctional and painful. One incident, in particular, etched itself deep within Doug’s memory. “I was in church, and a group of four women was sitting behind me. One turned to the others and whispered, ‘There’s the Congleton boy. He’ll never amount to anything because of where he came from.’

“I realized she was talking about me,” Doug says. “At the time I was thinking, what does she mean by where I came from? I knew my parents were divorced, but there was more to it than I understood at the time. Despite my confusion, the words really stung.”

 

MRS. HENRY

If the poorly chosen words of church gossip represented a scarring form of human behavior, Mrs. Henry characterized the exact opposite. “She changed my life,” Doug says.

“Mrs. Henry was the pastor’s wife of our church in Ventura. She knew what was going on in my family and was determined to make a difference.” She invited Doug home for lunch after church services. During those visits, she told him that she loved him, and Jesus loved him too. God would take care of Doug and lead him. He was valuable and worthy.

Mrs. Henry’s belief in Doug and her positive, caring influence made a lasting impression. She changed the trajectory of his life. In the years that followed, Doug attended a Christian high school and then worked his way through La Sierra University, a Christian institution of higher learning in Riverside, California.

Doug met his wife, Tami, after moving to Newbury Park, California. The couple had two sons, Travis and Trevor. Employed as a sales manager by Rubbermaid, Doug’s career was doing well. When the company transferred him to the Pacific Northwest, Doug and his family moved to Battle Ground, Washington, a small town near Vancouver.

Career Crossroads

Rubbermaid was preparing to promote Doug, but he felt the absence of something—like he might be missing a life calling.

“I was scheduled to fly to Houston for a national sales meeting. Before departing, my wife and I walked through the woods and talked about this,” Doug says. The couple prayed for God’s leading—for clarity in knowing whether Doug should continue with Rubbermaid and a likely promotion or whether there might be other work to do.

“In my prayer, I specifically said, ‘You know, Lord, how much I love kids because of where I’ve come from in my life with a broken home and all the difficulties. You know how important it is to me to help young people. If there’s any work along these lines, that would be amazing.’

“Then I grabbed my bag, went to the airport, and flew to Texas,” Doug recalls. “When I got to my hotel room, the red light on the telephone was blinking. My wife had left a message. Rick Fleck, the president of International Children’s Care (ICC), had called. They were looking for an executive director, and he wanted to interview me.”

“ICC is based in Vancouver, just a few miles from our home,” says Doug. I knew Rick from church and was well aware that the organization started by his parents was taking care of kids in desperate need in Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Columbia, Romania, and Mexico.”

Given the precise timing and the connection with kids, Doug and Tami felt this couldn’t be a coincidence. It must be a direct answer to their prayer. Doug interviewed and accepted the position.

 

Paying It Forward

“I’ve been with International Children’s Care now for 25 years,” Doug says. “We reach out to orphaned and abandoned children in various parts of the world. We now have 11 projects in five continents serving close to 600 children. In each project, we build anywhere from two to a dozen individual family homes. About 10 children are assigned to each home. Carefully selected married couples become their house parents. When the kids come to these homes, they cease to be orphans. They are part of a big family.”

Three weeks after joining ICC, Doug spent a few days at one of the projects in Mexico. On the final day of his visit, as he prepared to leave, he heard a little girl’s voice. “Uncle Doug! Uncle Doug!” Turning, he saw her running along the little dirt path, puffs of dust rising behind her feet. Jumping into his arms, she threw hers around his neck. “I want to thank you for saving my life, Uncle Doug, and for loving me!” she said.

“Right there, in my arms, was the reason for my life’s journey,” Doug says. “To touch another life and to make a difference—like Mrs. Henry did for me.”

 

SPECIAL GIFT

In his workshop, Doug inspects the pen one last time. He knows exactly who he’ll give it to. He’s crafted it for a struggling local teenager with whom he and Tami have become friends. Along with the gift, Doug will share the story of his childhood many years ago, hurtful words whispered in church, and the love shown to him through the person and actions of Mrs. Henry. He’ll tell of cutoff scrap lumber destined for the dumpster outside a busy cabinetmaker’s shop.

Worthless wood or exquisite art—what makes the difference? Doug knows. He slides the pen into a velvet sleeve, tightening the drawstrings on top before attaching a signed card and slipping it into a gift box. Love and time have smoothed away rough edges, abuse, and imperfections to reveal beauty within. In the woodworking shop, life and art coalesce. Perhaps with power to change the trajectory of another life.

Doug outside of his woodworking shop.

The Congleton family.

Read more about
ICC later in this newsletter

About the age he overheard the whisper in church.

Uncle Doug, impacting a young life at an ICC children’s village.

Doug Congleton always had perfect 20/20 vision and didn’t notice much change until age 60 when he started using reading glasses. A year later, he switched to prescription bifocals, which worked for several years until his vision worsened again. Doug was shocked when his eye doctor told him cataracts were the cause.

“Planning for surgery was somewhat scary,” Doug remembers. But the staff helped him feel comfortable and reassured about the procedure. “I was astounded that it only took seven minutes!”

Later that day, Doug started to notice a difference in his vision. “It was like a miracle. The colors were vibrant, and I could see so much light with my treated eye. But vision with the other eye was dim and had an amber tint. My treated eye returned to 20/20 and the difference was amazing!”

A week later, Doug had surgery on his other eye with similar results. “Now what I see is brighter, better, and more vivid than I ever remember. I’m very grateful to have my vision back.”

“It was like a miracle. The colors were vibrant, and I could see so much light with my treated eye. ”

DOUG’S CATARACT SURGERY

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oug Congleton pauses for a few moments outside his home woodworking shop in Battle Ground, Washington. He catches the sweet, subtle fragrance of Douglas fir trees and the melodic chirrups of birds playing in the branches overhead. Time slows. Moments like these, connecting with nature, aren’t to be rushed. For Doug, they bring a renewed sense of life and purpose.

Turning, he enters his shop. The work area isn’t large, but something profoundly meaningful happens here. It starts in a pile of castoff junk wood—leftovers from a cabinetmaker’s shop. “You really want those good-for-nothing cutoffs?” the cabinetmaker had asked. “If you have a use for them, they’re yours for the taking. Otherwise, they’ll end up in the dumpster.”

Now, months later, Doug reaches into the pile. Picking out a bruised and discarded chunk, he knows there’s a secret waiting inside. First, he cuts the wood to size—six inches long by three-quarters of an inch square. After drilling through the center of the entire length, Doug carefully positions the piece of wood in his lathe and locks it into place.

Donning eye and ear protection, he flips the switch and gently touches the rapidly spinning wood block with a sharp metal tool. As Doug carefully moves his tool back and forth along the spinning block, it changes shape. Sharp, rough, battered edges turn into sawdust and disappear, along with the outside dings and other imperfections.

 

“He’ll never amount to anything because of where he came from.”

As the imperfections vanish, a rich burgundy serpentine grain emerges, and the wood almost miraculously snaps to life. Soon the piece is completely round along its length. Over the course of 45 minutes, Doug continues to shape it—a little thinner here, a little thicker there. In gentle expert hands, what had been considered worthless has turned into a beautiful wood pen.

The project nears completion as Doug holds increasingly fine grits of sandpaper to the wood’s turning surface. Then he cleans the surface and applies a clear coat finish, which he also sands with an extremely fine-grit paper. Now the pen’s exterior is silky smooth, and the beauty of the grain glows beneath a satin sheen. He assembles the remaining items, and it’s an exquisitely rendered work of art—a writing instrument that tells a story of hidden beauty.

Throughout his career, Doug has had the privilege of seeing a similar story play out in the lives of hundreds of orphaned and abandoned children around the world.

TROUBLED CHILDHOOD

The youngest of four siblings, Doug was born in California in the late 1950s. His parents divorced while he was very young. “We were raised in Ventura, California, by our grandparents,” Doug recalls.

The early years were difficult, dysfunctional and painful. One incident, in particular, etched itself deep within Doug’s memory. “I was in church, and a group of four women was sitting behind me. One turned to the others and whispered, ‘There’s the Congleton boy. He’ll never amount to anything because of where he came from.’

“I realized she was talking about me,” Doug says. “At the time I was thinking, what does she mean by where I came from? I knew my parents were divorced, but there was more to it than I understood at the time. Despite my confusion, the words really stung.”

MRS. HENRY

If the poorly chosen words of church gossip represented a scarring form of human behavior, Mrs. Henry characterized the exact opposite. “She changed my life,” Doug says.

“Mrs. Henry was the pastor’s wife of our church in Ventura. She knew what was going on in my family and was determined to make a difference.” She invited Doug home for lunch after church services. During those visits, she told him that she loved him, and Jesus loved him too. God would take care of Doug and lead him. He was valuable and worthy.

Mrs. Henry’s belief in Doug and her positive, caring influence made a lasting impression. She changed the trajectory of his life. In the years that followed, Doug attended a Christian high school and then worked his way through La Sierra University, a Christian institution of higher learning in Riverside, California.

Doug met his wife, Tami, after moving to Newbury Park, California. The couple had two sons, Travis and Trevor. Employed as a sales manager by Rubbermaid, Doug’s career was doing well. When the company transferred him to the Pacific Northwest, Doug and his family moved to Battle Ground, Washington, a small town near Vancouver.

Career Crossroads

Rubbermaid was preparing to promote Doug, but he felt the absence of something—like he might be missing a life calling.

“I was scheduled to fly to Houston for a national sales meeting. Before departing, my wife and I walked through the woods and talked about this,” Doug says. The couple prayed for God’s leading—for clarity in knowing whether Doug should continue with Rubbermaid and a likely promotion or whether there might be other work to do.

“In my prayer, I specifically said, ‘You know, Lord, how much I love kids because of where I’ve come from in my life with a broken home and all the difficulties. You know how important it is to me to help young people. If there’s any work along these lines, that would be amazing.’

“Then I grabbed my bag, went to the airport, and flew to Texas,” Doug recalls. “When I got to my hotel room, the red light on the telephone was blinking. My wife had left a message. Rick Fleck, the president of International Children’s Care (ICC), had called. They were looking for an executive director, and he wanted to interview me.”

“ICC is based in Vancouver, just a few miles from our home,” says Doug. I knew Rick from church and was well aware that the organization started by his parents was taking care of kids in desperate need in Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Columbia, Romania, and Mexico.”

Given the precise timing and the connection with kids, Doug and Tami felt this couldn’t be a coincidence. It must be a direct answer to their prayer. Doug interviewed and accepted the position.

Paying It Forward

“I’ve been with International Children’s Care now for 25 years,” Doug says. “We reach out to orphaned and abandoned children in various parts of the world. We now have 11 projects in five continents serving close to 600 children. In each project, we build anywhere from two to a dozen individual family homes. About 10 children are assigned to each home. Carefully selected married couples become their house parents. When the kids come to these homes, they cease to be orphans. They are part of a big family.”

Three weeks after joining ICC, Doug spent a few days at one of the projects in Mexico. On the final day of his visit, as he prepared to leave, he heard a little girl’s voice. “Uncle Doug! Uncle Doug!” Turning, he saw her running along the little dirt path, puffs of dust rising behind her feet. Jumping into his arms, she threw hers around his neck. “I want to thank you for saving my life, Uncle Doug, and for loving me!” she said.

“Right there, in my arms, was the reason for my life’s journey,” Doug says. “To touch another life and to make a difference—like Mrs. Henry did for me.”

SPECIAL GIFT

In his workshop, Doug inspects the pen one last time. He knows exactly who he’ll give it to. He’s crafted it for a struggling local teenager with whom he and Tami have become friends. Along with the gift, Doug will share the story of his childhood many years ago, hurtful words whispered in church, and the love shown to him through the person and actions of Mrs. Henry. He’ll tell of cutoff scrap lumber destined for the dumpster outside a busy cabinetmaker’s shop.

Worthless wood or exquisite art—what makes the difference? Doug knows. He slides the pen into a velvet sleeve, tightening the drawstrings on top before attaching a signed card and slipping it into a gift box. Love and time have smoothed away rough edges, abuse, and imperfections to reveal beauty within. In the woodworking shop, life and art coalesce. Perhaps with power to change the trajectory of another life.