Friday, June 7, 2013

Homeless Bags: A Practical Way to Love Your Neighbor
June 7, 2013

One of the components of our church's small group vision is to do a group service project. In the past, many groups have helped out at the local Cold Night Shelter (His Place Ministries), served hot dogs at ROAR Sporting events, or even done Nursing Home Outreach and visitation. This year one of the more creative and practical service projects was something called "Homeless Bags" (see contents to the right).

At least two of our ladies' groups from Covenant participated in this type of service project and have found it to be a very simple way to make a small yet significant difference in our community. "What is a homeless bag?" you might ask. Well, one group describes them as such: "[We] made bags to keep in our cars to give to people when we see them... And if we see someone holding a sign that says "hungry" we give them these pre-made bags that have in them (ours are all different) something like a water bottle, a fruit cup and plastic spoon, a protein bar, some packaged trail mix or a granola bar. I have some with small cans of chicken salad and crackers. Whatever we can keep in the car."

But as we all know, just doing something for someone is not always enough. Every group that made the bags also included some form of evangelistic message. Whether it was a Gospel tract or simply a message that said, "You are made in the image of God. That makes you precious! God loves you! I hope this snack blesses you." Sandy Beckwith reports, "I've given out quite a few. One time really blessed me as I watched the guy read it as he walked back and he seemed touched...David and Katie are keeping one in their cars too. David gave out his first one the other day. He was glad to have it ready."


If you or your group have participated in any other service projects throughout this past year, please let us know (email me at rkent@covenantpalmbay.org), or simply leave some descriptions of the practical ways your group has shown God's love in the comment section below.