It hurts my heart to see needs unmet and people in pain. And I see a lot of hurting people. As the Executive Director of Our Daily Bread Soup Kitchen, I come in contact with so many people in our community that don’t know when their next meal is coming. Food insecurity is real. There are countless families that encounter this each day. To be able to fill such a vital need brings joy to my heart. I’ve also learned that many of these people often need a listening ear, an encouraging word and sometimes just a hug. Growing up in a large family, I know what it’s like to always have a sibling, parent aunt or uncle to talk to---but for many, they do not have family. Others may have family, but they live far away, so Our Daily Bread Soup Kitchen isn’t just a place to feed your body. Rather, it has become a place to come and feel the love of others. Everything we do at Our Daily Bread Soup Kitchen is about showing the love of Jesus. Everyone who works and volunteers at our Soup Kitchen shows love to each child and adult who walks through the door. It may be a smile, receiving a coat, or having someone ask, “how are you doing?” In addition to the Soup Kitchen, I’m also the co-founder of the Village of Barnabas, a mentoring program for troubled youth. Our goal is to save the lives of children. We mentor them, guide them, and expose them to things they might… Read More
How Everyday People Live Out Their Christian Faith
Illustrating how men and women display their love for Jesus in their day-to-day lives.
Little things that may have an eternal impact. Might these stories motivate you to use your talents?
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I am a foster mom to teenage girls who need an emergency placement. These girls are usually very confused and scared. So many times, they just don’t understand what is going to happen to them. They may only be with me for a day or two. But I want to ease their transition and help them feel as comfortable and as loved as possible during that time. The Bible says we are to take care of the orphans and the widows, and I felt called to do this. I first became interested in this when I worked as a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) for children in foster care. I saw their needs and the impact one volunteer could have on a child. I decided to get more involved, so I went through the training and became a foster mom in October 2019. Many girls who are placed in my home come with their possessions in a trash bag. They are only given about ten minutes to gather their things before they are whisked away to my home. Many times, they grab clothes and some possessions but don't have time to get things like deodorant, toothpaste, shampoo and socks. When they arrive, they are usually nervous, quiet and withdrawn. I knew I had to find a way to make the girls placed in my care feel more comfortable. I came up with a plan: when they arrive, we head to Shake Shack so it’s not just an awkward one-on-one at my house. We eat a good meal, and talk about their friends, their school… Read More
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How do we become workaholics? The roots are many but mostly from our early identity formation. My workaholic journey began in my teens. Just before entering high school, my family moved from an urban industrial multiracial working-class city to a laid-back middle class suburban community. The cultural shock knocked my identity off its foundation. To fit in, I unwittingly became a people pleasing overachiever. There are upsides to hard work and high achievements. But my story reveals the toxic side of this trait when it forms our identity. As an insecure adolescent, I just wanted to be accepted but did not understand the power of identity. I never knew when or if I achieved acceptance. The unending search became an elusive carrot on a stick I could never catch, even after I became a Pastor. Few of us understand this mostly unconscious and interior formation, so a toxic one easily develops. Balance is a leading indicator of a healthy identity. In my workaholic journey, no one saw how much I worked or could read my internal toxic identity map. To me, I thought it was all totally normal. Spoiler alert, identity is about who we are, not what we do. I would spend the next thirty years chasing this elusive carrot. Three months before turning fifty, I landed in an emergency room from a life-threatening heart attack. I am grateful God spared me. My body finally had enough of the crazy and busy life without balance. During my recovery, a Christian cardiologist looked at both aspects of my heart issue. He assured me he could… Read More
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We are 97-year-old twins and we can’t get out much anymore. But we can still do things to bring a smile to people. That’s why we started our ministry 12 years ago. We buy teddy bears and crochet handmade clothes for them and give these bears to children. My sister buys the bears and all the material we need. I crochet the outfits for the bears. It takes pretty much all day to make an outfit for one bear, but I don’t mind. I’ve got the time. We just want to bring some happiness to kids, some who don’t have too much. This all started when one of our church members had a child that was sick when we were 85 years old. We bought a bear, crocheted an outfit and we, as a congregation, prayed over that bear. Other children in our church saw it and wanted a bear themselves, so a tradition was started. We not only give them to kids going through a difficult time but also children as they graduate kindergarten. We’ll make them for newborn babies in our church—the outfit will be pink for a girl, blue for a boy. We even give them to high school seniors when they go off to college—the bears will be dressed in the colors of their high school, complete with a mortar board and tassel! There is a lot of prayer that goes into a bear before it leaves us. Since we know who will be receiving the bear, my sister and I are able to pray over the bear as… Read More
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We’ve always believed the Bible is clear that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Our faith was first tested in that 17 years ago when we were expecting our third child. I’d had some health issues which should have made pregnancy impossible. Several doctors advised us to terminate this pregnancy that was deemed potentially deadly for both of us. We refused, and our daughter was born healthy and beautiful. We knew our biological family was complete but we still felt a call to care for the orphans among us. So, in 2014, we became foster parents. It wasn’t long before God put the first of many girls in our lives. She was in our home for four years before she would officially become ours. Within a few months, we adopted another placement that had come into our lives. So we quickly went from a family of five to seven! Yet God wasn’t done with us. While we were out of state visiting a family friend, we came across two more girls that were in need of a family. Through God’s amazing provision, we ended up bringing those girls home the summer of 2018. We finalized their adoption March 2020, just before the pandemic closed down the courts. We have always sought to be used by the Lord, so when a call came in August for a “temporary” placement of a healthy baby boy, we felt we could manage something short term. Were we in for a surprise! Not only is that little boy still with us after eight months, but he came with… Read More
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Kids need to be loved, but also taught responsibility and respect for others. That’s what I try to teach them on my school bus. I approach it as my classroom but those kids have become my family. It all started a few years ago. I owned and ran a home repair business when my mom was diagnosed with COPD. She needed someone to take her to and from her medical appointments. I had driven trucks before, so I decided to become a school bus driver since it gave me the flexibility I would need. When I started, I saw some of the same ugliness on the bus that was in the outside world: intimidation, segregation, mean words, bullying. Things that shouldn’t exist anywhere, much less on an elementary school bus. I knew I couldn’t change the world but I could change the culture on my bus. After a lot of prayer, I formed a set of rules for the bus that dealt with respect, compassion and acceptance. Then, I set up certain jobs for the kids that mirror the outside world: police officers (to enforce kindness), fire department, doctors & nurses (if a kid scrapes a knee), a translator, even a president and vice president. Next, I thought of a way they could earn some things they needed for school to make it more like the real world. So I came up with a form of pay called bus bucks. I decided to pay each kid at least $5 in bus bucks each week (handled by the banker, one of the students on… Read More