First Congregational Church Youth Ministry

The 2009 Harvest Fair Car Wash was a success. Our annual car wash which raises funds for the annual Ski Trip took place on Oct. 17. About 10 students from the youth group gathered to wash cars and they were steadily (if not frustratingly) busy all day long from 8am-3pm. The church and all who gave towards our Ski Trip were very generous. We made $697 in donations! We’re now one step closer to going skiing in January. Thanks to everyone who supported our students and to everyone who helped make the Harvest Fair such a great event.

Please look forward to supporting our youth again in their upcoming See’s Candy Fund Raiser and on November 15th a the Rubio’s Lunch Fund Raiser (we’ll give you a flier to take in to Rubio’s and on that day and for everyone who brings in a flier the youth will recieve a portion of the percentage of the purchase). The Ski Trip is a little more expensive this year so we’ll need your continuing support. The lives of our youth are truly being changed and blessed by the ministry of this church. Thank you for yout help in making that possible.

One of our favorite service projects, the Crop Walk, is coming up on Oct 25th. According to the Church World Service website, Crop Walk is “Neighbors walking together to take a stand against hunger in our world. Together we raise awareness and funds for international relief and development, as well as local hunger-fighting.” And that’s an accurate description of what we will be doing.

Our church, along with some other churches in town, will be raising money and walking together to fight world hunger. We have about a billion hungry neighbors in the world, about 1.2 billion (one out of every six people in the world) to be a little more exact, are living off of less than $1 per day which is $365 per year if you add it up, which is less than a car payment for many of us, to be spent on food as well as other necessities. Another 1.6 billion people are trying to live off of $2 per day which, once again, just isn’t enough. Thirty thousand children die every day of hunger and preventable diseases. The statistics go on and on and the brain damage and disease, not to mention the death, which comes from this kind of famine is overwhelming to think about… much too overwhelming for one person to try to deal with. But the liberating beauty of God’s Kingdom is that it’s like a mustard seed, it starts small but it turns out big. We have the freedom to start small, and the Crop Walk is one small step toward a solution to these terrible problems in the world.

Part of being a Christian is seeing and responding to the need in the world. Jesus wouldn’t shield his eyes from world hunger, he’d do something about it and he is doing something about it through people like us, people willing to start small and to act out of compassion. Join us in acting out of compassion and walk with us on the Crop Walk.

Prior to the event we’ll be collecting funds for the event (get your collection packet from Wes or from the church office) and then on the 25th of October we’ll meet at the church yard at 12:30pm to begin the walk. We’ll walk about 3miles (which is far less than it sounds) and then we’ll celebrate with a barbeque at the church. Youth are encouraged to walk with family or to walk together.