Last Saturday was a busy day in and around the center. The servants from The Church at Red River gathered at the Bright House II and began the next phase of the restoration. Over 20 men, women and children were nailing, hammering, laughing, as the sheet rock began to go up! Even one of our long time pastors, drove up from New Orleans to be a part of the day! As we were leaving Saturday afternoon, Matt and Vicki were busy hosting the basketball team with their meal, Bible study and play. Scott and Jim went around to the camps, finding all doing well. Ardis and Momma T were busy wrapping bread. Shannon and Pam were busy in the Market putting away a huge donation of can goods. What a day! God is good!
Monday, our children came to learn, study and play. Great to see so many children and tutors come together learning from each other.
Wednesday, Scott and a new friend Bruce delivered a big donation of food to the Market from a Boy Scout food drive. Most Wednesdays you will find Pam and her dad working hard in the Market preparing for Thursdays. Every Wednesday morning you will find Ms Abbie and Stephanie working in the clothing room straightening, sorting and hanging clothes. What true servants of God, working behind the scenes and not getting the recognition they deserve.
Tuesday evening, Noel led the men's Bible fellowship, reading from John 15, the vine and bushes. Joey led us several weeks ago in this passage, but as usual, new thoughts and ideas arose from our discussions.
Thursday evening was a night to remember.Ms Abbie and Brother George got the evening off with praises and Words of wisdom in chapel. Not sure I have seen so much food, so many servants, so many community members at one time! Record number of people being served and going through the Market. Allison and Momma T spent Tuesday evening decorating the tables, the community came into the dining hall sat down and they were served a meal. We had long time friends, Tom and Judy join us for the evening, supplying us their food specialties to make the evening even more special. We had Brother George's church and a group from The Church at Red River help us serve, clean up and be our hosts for the evening. One of our long time supporters, Sherry, turn our back hallway into a photography studio and took portraits of the community all night long. Allison has a surprise for us all with the pictures after they are developed.
Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday to you today, Beth. Hope your day is special.
We have enough food from Thursday night to have left overs for this coming Thursday, Thanksgiving Day. We will warm them up, and serve those who come. If you want to get out of the house, we will be gathering around 4, pretty low key, visiting with each other and community.
This Saturday, Joey and his cooking crew will be hosting a breakfast for us all. Breakfast will be served at 8:30. A long time tradition of ours, that was postponed for awhile but Joey felt the need to get it going again. Joey will have a sign up sheet asking others to host upcoming breakfasts. Please come and enjoy the hot coffee and good conversations.
Happy Thanksgiving to everybody! What a special time of year to be with family and friends.
I saw in the newspaper several weeks ago about a promotion honoring several charities. The promotion was very nice but started me thinking about the word charity. I saw in an email last week asking of their members, to get involved because this is a good way to do charity work. All the organizations are doing good work for their clients but I thought to myself, common ground is not a charity, we don't do charity work.
As the community gathers in chapel each week, they visit with each other asking how their week went. Each week they ask how my wife is doing. Recently, one of our members told me not to worry about her, she would be gone for the next two weeks. They share with the community, their hurts and their joys. The kids run in and out of chapel, as they do at home. They come dressed up or in their work clothes. We get hugs from our community. We hear jokes, some I can't repeat here! When the community needs a place to gather for a funeral, a baby shower, a wedding, they gather at the center. We get to celebrate a graduation or morn a loss. We are family!
I put in a search for the word charity in the Bible and nothing came up?! Charity is not listed but the word love is. That is what common ground does, we lvoe! Lvoe puts you on a different level with community. There is no us and them, no better than, mentality, When our community hurts we hurt. When we see the darkness that surrounds our community, we fight to bring light. When we experience the challenges of living in poverty we long to break those chains of oppression.
In Colossians 3: it talks about the forgiving one another, forgive as the Lord has forgiven you. Then in verse 14 it says, "And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity." Our community is bound together in the lvoe of Jesus, no one better than another, no color is seen, just all of us trying to be the kind of people Christ is asking of us. When we fall, we have each other to help us get back on the paths we need to be on. Amen!
Have a great week of food, family and celebration of what God is doing in and through your life. You are an amazing group of people, doing God's work through lvoe!
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