My hubbie and I volunteer through our church with a variety of ministries. We have worked with our Food Pantry, which served over 3,500 meals last quarter alone in our small community. We both belong to a group that works on small home projects for folks who are unable to do these things for themselves. The biggest venture for us so far, though has been the culmination of our church’s year long planning for the one-week workcamp, which is done with our co-sponsor through the Group Workcamps Foundation. They describe their mission on their website:
How does a community respond to a tragic flood? In 1977, Loveland, Colorado responded by hosting the very first Home Repair Workcamp and the Group Workcamps Foundation began repairing homes – and in the process helped people in mending their lives.
At each Workcamp, hundreds of teenagers and adult sponsors come to a community like yours for a full week, and spend five days repairing homes for elderly, low-income, and disabled residents.
The preparation for the workcamp is monumental. Our steering committee requests applications from qualified area residents who are in need of work, selects the homes, determine the equipment and material needs, and ultimately welcomes 350 teen volunteers and their youth group leaders, who hail this year from states including Illinois, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maine and New Hampshire. The vans roll in on Sunday, and out pour hundreds of kids, who bring with them loads of joy, excitement and an abundance of an attitude of service. They pay to come to camp. Yes, let me say that again: they pay to come to camp, to scrape and paint homes in the heat and humidity, to repair porches, steps and railings, to sleep in sleeping bags in classrooms on the floor of our middle school, to connect with the residents, and especially for the opportunity to serve, grow in their faith, and to show God’s love in a practical way. Cool beans, as one of my friends says.
Here are some estimated numbers from this week, as we begin our Workcamp:
Towns served: About 13
Homes readied: About 50
Ladders loaned: Over 100
Volunteers arriving: 350
Goodie bags created: 360
Lunches prepped: Over 1,400
Meals made: Over 3,300
Hours worked: Over 9,000
Miles traveled: Thousands. Filled with many songs, bad jokes, much merriment, lots of junk food and very little sleep
What do they all add up to? Relationships forged. Paradigms shifted. Lives transformed. Really great stuff.
As I noted in my previous post about volunteering, I encourage you again to find a cause, a need in your community, even something so simple as an elderly neighbor who needs help bringing the groceries in from the car. I can't say it any better than Nike: Just do it.
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