Stupendous! Amazing! Outstanding! And Hallelujah!
What a terrific success our recent “Renew” event turned out to be.
Renew, for those who don’t know, is a missional aspect that has been birthed by our Praise Team. The hope is to utilize their musical skills in ways beyond the typical Praise Team activates on Sunday morning. The first activity was last March and included a special time of testimony and praise for the church body, intended to help facilitate a joint time of worship for our two services. They partnered with the Outreach committee, who then provided for an ice-cream social after the event.
But, core to the purpose of Renew is to value both inward-focused activities (such as the church social) with outward-focused ones (how to bless our community and, especially, to reach the lost). So the team, headed up by the talented Lynn Crawford, came up with a plan to have a music festival on the pier. But looking to bless the community in more ways still, the Renew team adopted the cause of helping “My Choices,” our local Crisis Pregnancy Center.
The Renew team once again partnered with the Outreach Committee, and with several other church bands, and a music festival was born. We had four different bands perform, with our own Praise Band bringing up the anchor position. But in addition to this, we set up a game section for kids to come and play. The automatic bubble blower was a huge hit with the toddler crowd!
We also had a prayer tent set up, along with a table where New Testaments were handed out. Scripture tells us that there is joy in heaven when even one sinner repents; may those prayers and Bibles bring about much angelic celebration!
We also had a hotdog booth set up where nearly 300 hotdogs were given away. Thanks to those who stood behind the grill on such a warm day.
And, of course, in all of our promotion throughout town leading up to the event, we asked people to bring diapers and wipes to donate to My Choices. They will then use these necessities to bless the young moms and dads who come to receive their services, which include everything from ultrasounds to parenting classes. And what a great job of promotion we did. Lynn called into the local radio station to share about the event, and after she hung up, the host celebrated her call as “exactly the sort of thing they want to hear about”.
At the end of the day, when the donations to My Choices were finally tallied, a total of 1,680 diapers were given to the organization, along with 6,780 wipes. And even some folks who happened by, not knowing to bring items to donate, gave a little bit of cash instead.
But all of this would not have been possible without the unified efforts of a unified church. Once all was said and done, we discovered that our 3 hour event utilized the talents of 47 volunteers who donated a total of 140 man-hours!
Thank-you to everyone who gave of their time, talent and resource to see this event carried off so well.
Blessings,
Tim
This article originally appeared in the September 2014 edition of the FBC newsletter. Click here to view the rest of this newsletter.