Stories — The Church has left the building?

Hey All,

Wanted to fol­low up on my last post about this past Sun­day with some sto­ries and quotes.  I hope to throw a pic­tures up soon as well. Enjoy!

-Kelly
“I will say how awe­some it was that every­one in our group pitched in where are strengths are. My mom and I tag-​​teamed on cook­ies (much bet­ter than we’ve ever worked together before … must be the size of the kitchen lol), George offered to tackle the onions, and Stephen gra­ciously taste-​​tested every­thing ;] Even the kids begged to do some­thing, and they did a great job plop­ping dough balls on the cookie sheets for us while the adults grabbed lunch. I found out from Mar­cia (via Face­book) that the meal we made is for one of Bridge of Hope’s men­tor­ing ses­sions. How cool is that? Here we were men­tor­ing each other, help­ing, shar­ing our sto­ries, and gen­er­ally get­ting to know each other, mak­ing food that will a group of men­tors to help out peo­ple who need it? – helping them, shar­ing sto­ries, get­ting to know each other and such. I also shared our church for­mat with one of my cowork­ers today, who’s in lead­er­ship at her church. She thought our idea was awe­some and wished her church was that kind of church. I can’t wait to do it again!”

–Stephen
“I really enjoyed the fel­low­ship and get­ting to know 2 new men who attend MCC (Isaac & George).  All while doing some­thing good for the community.”

-Heidi
“I think it was a great way to get to know peo­ple from church while doing some­thing nice for the com­mu­nity.  A win win event! =:)”

–Penny
“We had a great group of kids at the park.  Because there were so many we were done very quickly.  West White­land had a cou­ple peo­ple out to guide us and it was a won­der­ful expe­ri­ence.  I was so thank­ful to those doing child­care.  We were able to have the big­ger kids help in the gar­den but then go play when they were done.  The weather also held out so it was an enjoy­able day.  I can’t wait to go back with my fam­ily and see the butterflys”

–Rich
“We went to the home of Mar­ian (don’t know last name), in Cheyney.  We were met there by her son, Larry, who was wield­ing a chain saw when we arrived.  We were sup­posed to only have 6 vol­un­teers on the job, but were chal­lenged when we saw the work that was before us: clear­ing approx. 100 ft. of wild bushes, for­sythia plants that had grown 10 ft. high, sticker bushes, tree trim­ming, etc.  Undaunted, our orig­i­nal crew:  Kelly and Joe Joyce (sp.), Rad­cliff and Cathy Cun­ning­ham, and Lau­rel and Mac, dug right in.  How­ever, we were glad that we were joined later by Lau­rel and Jason Stroud, Angel­ica Tam­borino and Riley McDermott.

It was amaz­ing how much work our folks did in an hour and a half!  Joe’s pic­tures fea­ture promi­nently the high and wide stack of debris that was piled up after we con­cluded our work.  We also lined up for a “tug of war” as we pulled Larry’s lawn trac­tor out of the swamp their lower back yard had become.

Every­one was all smiles and jumped in!  Dar­lene and I are both going back in the next cou­ple of weeks to help fin­ish one or two items that we could not do because of the wet­ness and damp­ness.    I was happy to see my team not mind get­ting down and dirty to help another.  It was a great way to start the day.”