Reachout

Story from Servefest

Here is an email I received from one of our Reachout contributors. She planned and executed a project at a nearby nature trail and school and invited others to join her. I just love the fact that people at Restore are creating opportunities for us to serve our community.

Hi Patrick -- Our ServeFest project went well this morning! They were all ready for us with supplies and mulch and we were able to jump right in and get to work. We mulched a pretty good section of the trail (maybe 90 or 100 yards), plus did some dirt work diverting runoff, and took out some roots across the trail. We finished up just before noon. Mrs. Davis (from the school) and her husband worked with us. They were very appreciative of our help and would love to have us come again sometime.

G

Suds, Mops, and Rehab--July 2009 Servefest

Two of our teams fanned out across the Northland and one served in Liberty to help our community this morning. We do this every month and we call it Servefest.

The first team led by Janet McMahon headed to the Englewood Apartment Community Center to clean and prepare some rooms for an outreach event we are doing there in a couple of weeks. The event, called 'Character Club' is entirely organized and will be carried out by kids in our Student Community. I am so proud of them and I love how they are taking the idea of Reachout and making it their own.

A second team of approximately 15 people, led by Donna Bostick, headed to a local apartment complex to conduct a FREE Car Wash. The team has distributed fliers last week letting the residents know what we were coming. In two hours we washed 20 cars and had some really great conversations with some of the residents. We passed out Repay Cards and asked residents to pass the kindness along.

Finally, Nate Williams led a team in Liberty. This team helped rehab some apartments for one of our partners, Hillcrest Ministries.

All of this, and we had a blast doing it!

Variety During ServeFest

Our monthly serving on-ramp, ServeFest, is all about variety.

We deliberately plan and organize several different kinds of events for people. This allows a prospective contributor to show up to ServeFest and choose a service project that appeals to them.

The point is to make serving fun and one way to do that is to offer variety.

Bathroom Blitz...

During our March Servefest event we sent a team out to clean bathrooms of businesses along one of the major traffic ways here in the Northland. This intrepid group of people with a passion for Jesus gathered all of the supplies they needed and headed to serve. They went from business to business and said something like, "Hi, we're from Restore Community Church and we'd like to clean your bathroom--no strings attached."

Reaction varied. One business proprietor reluctantly agreed to let our team do it's thing. After the team had completed its work, the proprietor told them team that they were a huge help to the staff who had to contend with a busy morning crowd.

The team headed to a gas station and the attendant reluctantly agreed to let them serve. After they were done this young man told them about some of the difficulties he was facing in life. The team told him they would pray for him. They left for the parking lot and prayed together.

Of course, there were businesses that refused our service. But that's OK. Our team thanked them and wished them a good day.

The Bathroom Blitz is about shocking people with kindness. During our debrief we concluded that the Blitz is all about the element of surprise. People inevitably ask, "why are you doing this?" And we get a chance to explain--as best as we can. This leads to some interesting conversations and provides Restore a reputation as that church that serves with no strings attached. I'll take that any day.

The inspiration for this event comes from the work Steve Sjogren calls servant evangelism. You can find a ton of resources here.

Happy serving.

March 2009 ServeFest!

Last weekend 45 people showed up for our monthly serving event we call Servefest. Our people divided into five teams and fanned out across the Northland to serve our community.

Some handed out a free Coke along with a Repay Card, some went to the Kansas City Rescue Mission, and one brave team cleaned the bathrooms of businesses along Barry Rd.  One team headed down to English Landing Park and handed out water bottles to runners and picked up litter.

A contributor who spent the morning with the bathroom team told me after is was over, “I never thought that cleaning bathrooms would help people see Jesus—but that’s what happened.” 

I love that we are seeing more people show up for this event and I love that we are finding new and creative ways to serve.

And remember, that if you live in the Kansas City area, you are always welcome to join us.

Servefest is all About Planning and Rhythm

Once a month we provide people an opportunity to serve their community. We call it ServeFest.

Servefest is all about planning and rhythm. It's a form of spiritual discipline as far as I am concerned. We circle the date on the calendar and then plan start planning. It gives us a goal. We invite people and use the resources of the church to spread the word. We want Servefest to be an on-ramp for people to begin serving others.

I am convinced that we won't build a culture of serving unless we're intentional about it.

What about you? Does your church have some kind of regular serving event. What's that look like?

Thanks for Painting Chalkboards for Kids in Haiti

One of our Servefest Teams received this thank you note for their service at C3 Missions. It looks like we will be painting lots of chalkboards in the future...

Dear Esteemed First Ever Chalkboard Crew:

Joshua and Adrienne, Charlene, Patrick and Declan, Nate, Sara, Jamie & Brandon

On Behalf of 150 C3 orphans in Haiti and myself---I want to thank you again for giving your time and energy to transform cleverly disguised "clipboards" into chalkboard lap desks for the children of the Kusmin House of Hope in Haiti.  Each of those "clipboards" represents about 30 Haitian children that are in  our C3 schools.  So, there are thirty times the number we painted that will be waiting for their own chalkboard in the future...one home at a time.  Thanks for being the first ever chalkboard crew and making it happen for these children. 

We will send you pictures of the children as we give them your handy work!

Blessings and thanks once again!
Marsha

February 2009 Servefest

I feel much better.

We organized our February ServeFest and 20 people showed up to kick off the 2009 serving year. We took a break from serving in January to meet as a team, reflect on 2008, and plan 2009. It felt weird not having a corporate serving event. By the end of January I was feeling like Reachout had lost its rhythm or something.

So to start the 2009 year off we sent two teams into the community.

The first team, led by Josh Miller, headed to Hillcrest Transitional Housing and helped paint an apartment that will house a family who graduates from their program.

The second tea, led by Brandon Leininger, headed to the offices of C3 Missions International to paint clipboards with chalkboard paint for the kids in Haiti to use during their school lessons. (Paper and pencil being items that are hard to come by in Haiti.) This team painted 150 clipboards in three hours!

New people showed up. Participants in both events told me how much they enjoyed themselves. And I know that our teams made an impact. Most important, we got our serve back on.

Natronic on ServeFest

Check out Nate's blog post about ServeFest.

Serve.Love.Change.

November ServeFest Notification

Please join us for ServeFest this Saturday, November 15th at 9AM.  

Servefest is an opportunity to gather together and serve our community.

We will meet in the parking lot of Park Hill High School at 9 AM (the same parking lot where we park for services). We will divide into teams and serve the community. One team will be raking leaves in the community. Another team will do some work with Hillcrest. Our Reachout team is also working on other service projects that may or may not be available.

We will supply all of the materials but we do ask you bring a rake if you have one!

Here is all you need to do?

1.   Show up at the parking lot of Park Hill High School by 9 AM. Rain or Shine!

2.   Wear comfortable work clothes. (Some of you may be painting). Wear your Restore T-Shirt if you have one!

3.   Bring your own water or snacks.

4.  Come prepared to serve and have fun!

We encourage you to invite a family member or friend to serve with you.

Please feel free to email me with th any questions  

For more information about Hillcrest click here: http://www.hillcresttransitionalhousing.org/

Serve.Love.Change