We Need Your Stuff!

Are you looking for a way to help those in need as you clean out your closets? You can donate items to meet the needs of impoverished children living at the Navaho Nation reservation in New Mexico. Resurrection sent a team there in June to help with their vacation Bible school program. Our team was very sobered to see the great financial needs of these children and their families.

Russell Mosburg, who led the Resurrection team there, said the reservation is in need of the following items:

Wal Mart gift cards for back to school shopping

Bikes — any size and style,  but NOT 10-speeds with skinny tires as they will not hold up on the rough roads

Jeans — blue and/or black in color; good condition; all sizes

Athletic Shoes — all sizes / types; good condition

Shirts — all sizes of tee shirts; dress shirts; no low cut or t-strap revealing shirts

Baby clothes & blankets

Toys (non-electronic) — balls, trucks, dolls, games, blocks, etc.

Backpacks — in good shape for school

You can drop off your donations at Church of the Resurrection, 13720 Roe, at the east building this Saturday, July 12. Please mark your items for Navajo Nation. You can also drop off your donations at Russell’s house at 15639 Beverly Street in Stanley (66223) all week. Contact Russell at 913.707.0821

The Circle is Complete

At the April 15, 2006 FaithWork event, a group of FaithWork volunteers did some extensive yard work for Sandy, a Resurrection member who had a near-death experience that included a coma and then months of recovery. Sandy recently wrote me to share the rest of the story:

“I wanted to thank you for doing so much for me at a time when I REALLY needed it. I recently married a wonderful man, who also attends Resurrection with me. Before coming to this church, he had never attended a Bible study. He has been so excited to learn all these Bible-based truths at Resurrection and to grow spiritually. It has given us a foundation and purpose for our marriage.

I am doing a FaithWork project at Grand Avenue Temple with my Life Worth Living Class. I am blessed to give back just a wee portion of what the other FaithWork volunteers have given to me.

Your volunteers made a big difference in my life. I thank God for the support FaithWork gave us.”

Way to go, team!

Don’t Miss the Fun!

  What was the coolest thing Resurrection members did in the inner-city last summer? It may very well have been our Paint the School project, in which 1,300 volunteers painted all the classrooms and hallways and repaired the gym floor at Phillips Elementary. The fun didn’t stop there though. Our children’s ministry provided supplies for the classrooms, our volunteers gave teacher appreciation gifts and luncheons, hosted holiday events for the students and much more. It was a BLAST!

The fun continues this year as we seek to bless Troost Elementary, an urban KCMO school. This year, we hope to round up 1,500 volunteers and judging by our congregation’s enthusiasm, I don’t think that will be a problem!

If you are interested in participating but hesitant to drive to the inner-city or want to go down as part of a team, sign up for our Bless the School Project at the June 21 FaithWork. We will provide free bus transportation and the bus will return to Resurrection by about 1:30 p.m. Volunteers for this project only must be at least 12 years old. If you wish to participate, you must reserve a spot on the bus by contacting me at Cathy.Swirbul@cor.org Then plan to meet in the Resurrection lobby at 9 a.m.

Don’t miss out on the fun!

 

How Awesome is That?

When you’re feeling blah in your faith, overworked and out of touch, I’m convinced that the best way to reconnect with God and others is by serving those in need. From the reports I’ve received, the FaithWork folks who went out to serve last Saturday certainly experienced this.

One team of teen girls went to Hillcrest Transitional Housing, which helps provide shelter and self-sufficiency for homeless families. They helped clean and paint an apartment that will soon be occupied by a new family. After they worked for a few hours, the other formerly homeless families cooked and served the volunteers a wonderful BBQ lunch! The families shared their stories of hopelessness and then renewal with the volunteers.

“Our Hillcrest residents wanted to feed the volunteers lunch and they wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer,” said Marilyn Minter, Hillcrest’s director. “The residents wanted to serve the meal as part of their community skills class  in which they are learning to show appreciation for others. I think our residents learned just as much as the volunteers did that afternoon.”

Then, I just received an e-mail from an adult that accompanied the girls on the project. She said that these teens have been contributing to a missions fund (These kids rock!) and want to send the donation to Hillcrest. They were so impressed with the way God has used Hillcrest to turn around the lives of these homeless families. The blessing continues!

A great place to hang out!

Soup kitchen projects are probably the most popular service opportunities with Resurrection volunteers. I’m not sure why but my guess is that serving and sharing a meal is a comfortable way for people from different worlds to connect.

The Splendid Torch

I love this quote by George Bernard Shaw:

 

“This is the true joy in life — the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one, the being a force of nature instead of feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. 

 

I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I’ve got ahold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.” 

 

So what does this quote have to do with my involvement with FaithWork and my spiritual journey? Namely this: that when I quit spending countless hours merely studying the Bible and instead “did” the scriptures by serving those in need, my faith went from a smoldering flame to a splendid torch.

 

Jesus said that whomever loses his life for Jesus’s sake, truly finds his life. This isn’t a pithy saying. I’ve experienced it and found it to be true. Suddenly, the One who I have claimed to follow for years has become very real to me. Why? Because when Jesus was alive, He spent much of His time hanging out with the downtrodden and ministering to them. Where can you still experience His presence today? You guessed it, with the downtrodden.

 

I’m not saying that you won’t experience Jesus in the ‘burbs. I will say, though, that He is hard to miss in the inner-city. So why do a bunch of well-heeled Johnson Countians spend so much time in the urban core serving on FaithWork projects? For a lot of us, we can’t think of a more exciting place to serve.

    

What about you? What experiences have caused your faith to come alive? Have you caught glimpses of God’s Spirit at work?

 

Welcome to the conversation!

   We are a community of Christ followers and Christ seekers from Church of the Resurrection and Kansas City. Our desire is to regularly step outside our comfortable suburban world to serve the poor and help contribute to the good in our community.

Cathy Swirbul, a Resurrection staff member, is the primary blogger but all are welcome to contribute. We can chat about social justice, experiencing Christ among the poor, racial reconciliation, the issues related to poverty … whatever is on our minds. So grab a cup of coffee and join in the conversation!

Note about the photo above: I’m not crazy about including a photo of myself on this blog only because it seems kind of arrogant. However, I do want to make this blog warm, welcoming and personal and including a photo does seem to further that goal.