This is reaching back in time a bit, but I want to post about it. As part of our church's 50th anniversary celebration, it was decided we didn't want to purely focus on ourselves and how great we are (though there was plenty of that type of celebrating too), so a service day in the community was planned. What a great idea. It was set up as a morning session of service, an afternoon session of service, and then faspa followed by a worship service in the late afternoon/early evening. We actually missed church on the sign-up days but were called to fill open slots. We spent the afternoon at Kidron Bethel visiting people who don't get many visitors. The first three people I tried to visit sent me away! And then the next person wasn't in her room! I was beginning to feel like a real failure. When I got to the fifth person's room, she was there and was someone who couldn't really hold a conversation but who liked to talk, so I mostly sat there and tried to decipher what she was saying and respond appropriately. A few times she seemed to respond directly to what I had said, which made me happy. Since it was a low pressure interaction and since I had struck out so many times previously, I stayed with her quite a while. The last person on my list was a man, but only his wife was in the room. Instead of telling her, "Oh, I'm supposed to visit your husband," (which seemed rude), I stayed to talk with her; it was a blessing. She was one of my grandma's friends when she and her husband still lived in assisted living and seemed so happy that I was there to visit with her. Neither she nor her husband nor I could see why they had to be living in healthcare now: they can walk, dress themselves, feed themselves, seem of very sound mind. It's kind of sad. And she said it's sad to have to live there and see so many people who need so much help with everything.
That got a lot longer than I intended. So that's where we spent our service day. Other projects included painting the entire public swimming pool, painting basketball court lines at public parks, planting/landscaping for several outreach organizations, working at MCC, cutting out supplies for public schools, and probably other services I'm forgetting. The faspa was good, and the service was probably the most meaningful of any I've been to in a long time.
I hope we do more service days. Quarterly would be nice. The church wants to figure out how to attract more young people? I think this is a great way. Tangible works that help others. Plus, you build community within the church too by working alongside people you may not otherwise talk with often.
EDIT: I meant to also include that 144 people participated. I believe our membership is 300-something, and our "regular attenders" number around 220? 250? So pretty great participation. Good job, Faith!
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