Them Before Us #092 | How Can We Save Families Before Tragedy | Upstream Collaborative

Overview

In this episode, host Jennifer Friesen welcomes Phil and Melody, Co-Directors of Upstream Collaborative, to discuss innovative strategies for family preservation and preventing childhood abuse and neglect before they escalate into tragedies. Their approach involves proactive community engagement—especially through churches—and collaborative support systems that address root causes such as social isolation and temporary crises. The conversation explores the limitations of reactive state intervention, the unique power of faith communities, and the synergistic impact of collaboration across multiple family-centered ministries.

Main Themes & Purpose

• Introducing Upstream Collaborative, an organization focused on proactive, community-driven solutions to prevent family breakdown and child welfare crises.
• Exploring how social isolation and temporary crises are key drivers behind child abuse, neglect, and the need for foster care.
• Highlighting the church’s unique capacity to offer relational support that state/government cannot provide.
• Advocating for a collaborative network of ministries (pro-life, fatherhood, mentorship, crisis hosting) to holistically address family vulnerability.
• Offering practical steps for churches and individuals to get involved in upstream (preventative) family preservation efforts.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The “Upstream” Approach to Family Preservation

• Stream Analogy: Upstream Collaborative works to prevent children from “falling into the stream” of crisis—that is, to prevent families from breaking down in the first place, rather than just rescuing kids after harm has occurred.

  • Phil: "Our whole idea is that... if we're being really wise about this, let's go upstream and see why kids are ending up in the stream in the first place." [01:23]
  • Key Data: Two of the top four reasons for child abuse or neglect are social isolation and temporary crisis (citing the National Clearinghouse on Child Abuse and Neglect). [03:30]

• Actionable Upstream Solutions:

  • Community programs to reduce social isolation.
  • Temporary, practical support for families in crisis (e.g., crisis child hosting).

2. The Unique Role of the Church vs. State

• Government Limitations:

  • Phil: "The foster care system does a pretty woefully inadequate job of helping to build the relationship between the bio parents and foster parents." [04:56]
  • The state can provide safety but struggles to offer the relational, communal support needed to address root causes.

• Church as Family:

  • Phil: "The strongest resource that churches have to offer is the community. And when that community can wrap around socially isolated families, we see God go to work in some pretty significant ways." [05:44]
  • The faith community can directly address relational poverty, mentoring, and ongoing support in uniquely deep ways.

3. Building a Collaborative Movement

• Professional Support & Networked Learning:

  • Upstream Collaborative is both a resource-sharing network and a support hub for organizations launching or running family preservation ministries.
  • Melody: "We decided we really wanted to create a collaborative organization where everybody's a learner and everybody's a teacher." [08:09]
  • Monthly calls, shared resource banks, and coaching for organizations nationwide.

• Donor Support:

  • Donors provide backing that enables free or reduced-cost coaching/support for collaborative member organizations.

4. The Four Branches of Upstream’s Model

1. Pro-Life Ministries & Pregnancy Centers

   • Partnerships with pregnancy centers to provide relational and material support to mothers considering life for their babies, addressing root causes of abortion such as isolation.
   • Phil: "The Lord doesn't use a diaper to change someone's life. He uses relationships." [13:32]

2. Fatherhood Initiatives

   • Addressing fatherlessness as a root cause of family breakdown and negative societal outcomes, with plans for collaborative innovation in this space. [14:50]

3. Mentorship and Discipleship

   • Church-driven, gospel-focused mentorship for families and youth—not just programmatic but deeply relational and faith-based.

4. Crisis Child Hosting

   • Volunteer families host children temporarily during family emergencies, providing a buffer before state intervention.

5. The Impacts of Family Separation

• Societal Consequences:

  • Only 50% of foster children are reunified with family; aged 12+ have a 91% chance of “aging out” with no family.
  • Those aging out of foster care are disproportionately represented among the homeless, incarcerated, and even death row populations.
  • Melody: "Once a kid is in the foster care system, they have less than a 50% chance of ever being reunified...those kids make up 50% of our homeless population, 60% of our prisons and 80% of death row." [16:30]

• Preventability:

  • 70–76% of foster placements are attributed to preventable issues such as neglect due to poverty, which often co-occurs with social isolation.

6. Mobilizing Local Churches

• Whole Church Engagement vs. Individual Volunteerism:

  • Striving for collective church participation rather than isolated volunteers to ensure sustainable, community-wide impact.
  • Phil: "We are uncompromising on this... we want whole church engagement, not individual volunteerism." [21:02]
  • Most church partners engaged after lay members shared the vision with leaders.

• Practical Steps for Church Involvement:

  • Interested individuals are encouraged to bring the vision to their church leadership and involve the entire congregation for maximum effect.

7. National Conference: “Unshakable”

• Annual February Event (Florida, Feb 4–6):

  • Open to all interested in family preservation, with a focus on trauma understanding, poverty's impact, and soul care for ministry workers.
  • Features: Equipping sessions, team/one-on-one coaching, practical breakouts, and intentional “call to act” session.
  • Melody: "We want to equip them well to be on mission and to be in the battle that God has called us to." [25:01]

• Membership & Resources:

  • Organizations are vetted before joining as members (to protect the collaborative environment).
  • Resources are freely shared among committed members.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "If we're being really wise about this, let's go upstream and see why kids are ending up in the stream in the first place."
  — Melody, [01:23]

• "The state cannot solve social isolation... In God's word, he places the lonely in families. This is at the heart of what he wants his church, the bride, to be."
  — Phil, [05:14]

• "The Lord doesn't use a diaper to change someone's life. He uses relationships."
  — Phil, [13:32]

• "Once a kid is in the foster care system... those kids make up 50% of our homeless population, 60% of our prisons, and 80% of death row."
  — Melody, [16:30]

• "We are uncompromising on this... we want whole church engagement, not individual volunteerism."
  — Phil, [21:02]

• "If the research is showing us we can logically tie together the prevention of families being broken apart from people being on death row. Like we've got to try and we've got to get as many people to line the banks of the stream and keep families from falling in it that we can."
  — Melody, [17:45]

• "We really love the verse that talks about two are better than one, for there's good return for their labor."
  — Melody, [10:40]

• "We want to equip them well to be on mission and to be in the battle that God has called us to."
  — Melody, [25:01]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Upstream Collaborative Intro & Stream Analogy: [01:05–04:31]
• Government vs. Church in Social Support: [04:31–06:30]
• Collaboration & Network Building: [07:26–10:45]
• The Four Ministry Branches: [11:43–15:45]
• Systemic Impact of Family Separation: [15:46–18:40]
• Church Engagement Strategies: [20:50–22:23]
• National Conference Details: [22:36–26:15]
• Getting Involved and Contact Information: [26:25–27:11]

How to Get Involved

• Visit: www.upstreamcollab.org
• Contact: melody@upstreamcollab.org
• Conference Info: February 4–6, 2026, Deerfield Beach, Florida (open to all)
• Social Media: Instagram and Facebook – organization shares articles, events, and resources for the movement.

Summary:
This engaging episode offers a thorough look at how Upstream Collaborative and its partners are equipping communities to address the root causes of family crisis. By prioritizing relationships and whole-church engagement, and by uniting diverse ministries in a shared mission, Upstream Collaborative is pioneering a practical and spiritually grounded solution to family breakdown—with the ultimate aim of reducing the number of children entering state care and transforming both family and societal outcomes.