Kids & Family

Elijah's Promise's Finston Announces New Phase of Journey to Help Those in Need

Lisanne Finston, the executive director of Elijah's Promise, will depart her position in December to take a job as executive director of a residential treatment center for people with mental illness.

20 years ago, Lisanne Finston was a young assistant pastor with a Methodist church in New Brunswick when the position of executive director became available at a young organization called Elijah's Promise.

It consisted of three local churches - St. John's Episcopal, Emanuel Lutheran and Christ Episcopal - that had forces to open a small soup kitchen in an attempt to feed some of the city's impoverished residents.

They called it "Elijah's Promise," a nod to a biblical passage in which the prophet Elijah is fed by a widow who in turn is rewarded with a promise that she will have enough to eat even in the harshest of times.

Finston took the reins of the organization, and since then, that small soup kitchen has grown into a prolific anti-hunger organization that affects much of central New Jersey.

Now, 20 years later, Finston will leave New Brunswick for her next adventure.

At the end of the year, she will move her family to western Massachusetts to begin a job as the executive director of Gould Farm, a 100-year-old residential treatment community for people living with mental illness.

She will depart her position with Elijah's Promise in mid-December, the same month as her 20th anniversary with the the organization.

Finston said she was not in search of a new job when she stumbled upon the position.

"I was really happy at Elijah's Promise," she said.

After meeting with the staff of Gould Farm, Finston said she feels a good synergy between her skill set and the mission of of the center.

And while she is sad to leave Elijah's Promise, the organization is healthy and will continue as normal when she steps away, she said.

"The best time to move on is when things are going well," she said. "I hate to leave but I do feel like New Brunswick is in a good place."

Finston leaves behind an organization that has grown into one of New Brunswick's most influential and beloved nonprofit organizations, having affected the lives of thousands of Middlesex County residents.

"Lisanne Finston saved a lot of lives," said Michelle Wilson, Associate Director for Elijah's Promise.

One of those lives belongs to chef Leslie Nyambasora, an instructor at the Promise Culinary School.

Nyambasora said she was a mother and drug user who came to the soup kitchen for her meals and to volunteer a bit. After a while, Nyambasora cleaned up her life and wanted to make a fresh start, and Finston helped her.

"She gave me the chance to be responsible," Nyambasora said.

A graduate of the Promise Culinary School, Nyambasora has been an instructor with Elijah's Promise for five years.

In addition to being a helping hand, Finston has been a hardworking boss who gets her hands dirty, Nyambasora said.

"She's an all errand chick," she said.

Chef Carol Eggleston agreed.

"There's never a problem with Lisanne, there's always a solution," she said.

The organization is sad to see Finston go, Wilson said. However, her departure will not impact their services.

"We're a strong institution," she said.

The position of executive director will be posted on the Elijah's Promise website soon, and the the Elijah's Promise board will begin their search for a new director, Wilson said.

They are willing to wait for the right candidate, and have faith that their next executive director will be just as strong of a person to carry on the work of Elijah's Promise, she said.

When Elijah's Promise began, it operated solely as a soup kitchen, serving meals seven days a week at Christ Episcopal Church, Finston said.

In 1994, the offices of Elijah's Promise moved to its current location on Livingston Avenue. That's when the organization really started to take off, Finston said.

Today, Elijah's Promise serves approximately 400 free meals per day in its Neilson Street soup kitchen, which is open seven days a week, rain or shine, holidays included.

They have yet to miss a day of serving, Wilson said.

"(Finston) knows and we know that if we're not open, people aren't eating," Wilson said.

Elijah's Promise operates a community kitchen in Highland Park, "The Better World Cafe" which operates on a "pay-what-you-can" model in addition to serving locally sourced, healthy food.

The nonprofit is also a leader in local food and social enterprise movements in New Brunswick, including community gardens, a Community Shared Agriculture (CSA) program, and research projects that examine the accessibility of healthy food in New Brunswick neighborhoods.

The Promise Culinary School serves as the organization's education and job training wing, taking in adults who are in search of career training or a change in jobs and teaching them culinary arts and baking in a state-recognized program.

And, when needed, the organization provides relief efforts and social services through its HEART program and "Code Blue," which opens the soup kitchen as a shelter to the city's homeless on dangerously cold nights.

Mayor James Cahill called Finston a valued source of counsel and described her as "a driving force in the development of the heart and soul of New Brunswick."

"It's often said that a community is judged by how it treats its most vulnerable members," Cahill said. "Lisanne's service to those most in need has provided the New Brunswick community with a real moral compass and inner sense of how we should treat one another."

Despite her acceptance of the new position, Finston is not checking out just yet. There are "loose ends" to tie up, and above all else, people to say "Thank you" to, she said.

"I hope more than anything to say "thank you" to as many people as I can who have given so much to me," Finston said.

Chef Pearl Thompson came to Elijah's Promise in 1995 as a professional chef volunteering her time for a holiday dinner, and said her first experience with Finston was actually a spat over Thompson's late arrival.

Years later, the organization needed a professional chef to get the culinary school off the ground, and she successfully applied. She's been there ever since.

The woman who Thompson had a bit of apprehension over meeting again has become "an inspiration" in her leadership and sense of humanity, she said.

"She epitomizes everything I want to be in life," she said. "I feel like I am losing a whole half of my body."

City residents will have a chance to see Finston in action on November 3 at the annual Elijah's Promise Turkey Trot in Buccleuch Park, where she will serve as the day's grand marshal.


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