Crossroads Reaches for Hope
POSTED ON Mar 24, 2010 / UPDATED ON Jan 27, 2011
Each meal received a Bible verse sticker in French.
All ages and heights joined in serving.
Bible verse T-shirts went into every box.
All of the boxes were decorated with love.
5 hours. 550 people. 50,000 meals.
“I think this was really good for our first experience partnering with Children of the Nations,” said Stephen Janho, College Minister of Crossroads Bible Church in Bellevue, Washington.
Several weeks ago, the elders of Crossroads collected a benevolence fund offering to aid victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti. As one part of their efforts, they chose to join with COTN to hold a meal packaging event on February 26, which they called “Reaching for Hope in Haiti.”
“We really promoted it as a family event, and it was amazing to see such diversity in ages, with everyone getting involved and serving,” said Stephen. “It’s hard to duplicate that.”
“The feeling was electric!” said Fraser Ratzlaff, COTN–Seattle Feeding Coordinator. “I had a phenomenal time working with them…. It felt like the congregation was just primed to serve.”
Some of those servants were Stephen’s students, who were readying themselves for an upcoming mission trip. He said that the high school and college students of Crossroads participate in a short-term mission trip to San Francisco each year. There, they join with local ministries to serve the homeless and take on other service projects. According to Fraser, the students also participated in the Hunger Experience as part of their preparation this year.
The Hunger Experience is a month-long, group-based activity designed to teach about the issue of world hunger in a powerful, tangible way. Groups spend time learning about hunger, and then they experience it through fasting. While fasting, they raise funds for use in a meal packaging event, just like the one held at Crossroads.
During the Crossroads event, these high school and college students took on many of the organizational and leadership roles, orchestrating and directing other members of the congregation. “These kids really stepped up,” Stephen said.
If you asked Fraser, he would say the entire congregation stepped up. Fraser expressed amazement at the level of dedication and involvement the people of Crossroads demonstrated. “They had printed Bible verses in French on stickers that they put on every meal,” he said. “Each box they packed got T-shirts and eight Gospel tracts in Creole! They even had the younger children coloring the boxes with messages of hope!”
Stephen commented, “I really want to stress that if churches are looking for a great way to get families involved and build leadership while providing for the needy at the same time, this is it.”
After such a glowing endorsement, it came as no surprise that he said, “Oh, yeah, we’ll do it again!”
If you would like to get involved or are interested in more information about your own meal packaging event please contact info@cotni.org.