YOUR COMMUNITY MINISTRIES (UPDATE)

YOUR COMMUNITY MINISTRIES (UPDATE)

By Dan Philips
FUMC has continued to support our Community Ministries during these difficult times, and it has been a blessing for many. Here are some things we’ve been able to continue doing in order to reach out to our neighbors.
 
Loaves & Fish
We continue to serve 150-200 of our neighbors in need each Saturday. We are also providing food from our pantry; a nutritious lunch; hygiene bags; and recently, 150 protective handmade face masks (provided by Di Wu and her friends at the Peoria Chinese Community). Our recent food drive yielded thousands of pounds of wonderful donations from so many of you in addition to cash and gift card donations enabling us to have enough blessings to share each week.
 
Backpack Buddies
The Backpack team packs 300 bags of food each week. The bags are taken to Lincoln K-8 School to provide weekend nutrition, supplementing the lunches provided during the week by District 150. It was recently announced that the D150 weekday feeding program will continue throughout the summer. The Backpack team and D150 will do everything possible to make sure the Lincoln K-8 students have food every day of the week. We extend our thanks to the team and to our partners for stepping up to this need.
 
Neutral Ground
At this time, Neutral Ground clients are being served offsite by Positive Health Solutions. We are working with them to provide the supplies that clients would normally receive when coming to the church.
 
Morton Square Soccer
The 2020 soccer season was cancelled due to the pandemic. However, we are working on ways to keep in relationship with those that participated with us last year. If possible, we would like to have a one day celebration in Morton Square Park later in the summer. Those plans will depend on what the State and local health departments recommend at that time.
 
Lincoln K-8 Buddies
Since this program is a one on one, relational ministry, it has been a tough one to continue. The Buddies program provided tutoring, birthday recognitions, and arts programming. We will be working with Lincoln K-8 to determine if an online version of what we do can be developed for the future, in case schools remain closed in the fall..
 
Police Prayer Team
This team’s role as a relational support group is more important now than ever before as our front line officers and responders are dealing with additional physical and emotional challenges every day. The cards sent and the prayers prayed for each officer serve an important role in caring for those that care for all of us.

photo by Jeanette Kosier