Each serving
group was super excited to enter into their second day of serving the
organizations where they started making relationships the day before.
Serving
Group 1:
Serving Group
1 had the opportunity to make new friends at a ministry site called Fifty
Forward this morning. Fifty Forward is a senior citizens day care center based
out of a local church. The group was able to mingle with the attendees and
build relationships with them by talking about their families and playing games
together. The team also played a few songs for their new friends, and these
efforts were met with lots of appreciation and applause. After serving lunch to
the seniors and eating with them, the team transitioned to Operation Stand
Down, a nonprofit resource for veterans providing services such as housing,
employment readiness training, and coordination between other service agencies.
Serving Group 1 helped with a lot of different tasks, such as cleaning
different parts of the building and organizing both the donations and the
housing supplies. The team was encouraged to hear that our veterans had such a
great resource available to them in an effort to end veteran homelessness in
Nashville. The group finished their time at this site by walking through the
Thrift Store attached to the ministry (which provides revenue for Operation
Stand Down) before taking advantage of some free time by enjoying some local
gourmet popsicles. After wandering briefly through a local farmer’s market, Serving
Group 5 enjoyed dinner at International Market Thai restaurant before heading
back to the housing site.
Serving
Group 2:
For the second
day, Serving Group 2 headed straight to Y-CAP to hang out with lower-income
children in the area. The team got to work with their middle school group,
playing games with the kids and building relationships with them. While at
Y-CAP, they had to opportunity to serve in a community garden called “crop
city” where they got to learn about the food desert, the lack of grocery stores
and fresh, healthy food resources, that exists in East Nashville. After eating
lunch in a local park, the team went to Nashville CARES, an AIDS prevention and
educational ministry. Here the group learned statistics and facts about AIDS
and ways to prevent it. Following working with their ministries, the group
partook in some team bonding in the form of going to get popsicles and playing
in some local water fountains. The group has already developed such strong
bonds with the people at their serving sites, and everyone is excited to continue
to strengthen the bonds during the rest of the week. They finished up their day
by eating some Turkish food, a food genre that no one in the group had ever
experienced before. Even though it was really different for a lot of them, they
loved getting to experience a new culture.
Serving
Group 3:
Serving Group
3 started off their second morning again at Family Affairs Ministry, a
community center focused on restoring families through programming and social
services. The team began their day by serving breakfast to the kids and had
their second day of “Sidewalk Sunday School,” singing songs with the children
and helping engage the students in a fun biblical teaching. Once the large
group lesson had been taught, the children were divided into age groups, and
several team members helped each group with different educational activities,
from math lessons to bible verse memorization. The group then left for a local
park where they had lunch and started a spirited game of football with local
children hanging out at the park. After lunch, the group headed over to another
ministry called End Slavery, a ministry looking to raise awareness and
ultimately put an end to sex slavery. After getting acclimated with the
ministry and what slavery looks like here in the United States, the group
headed out to pass out door hangers, educating the public on the common traps
for slavery. Group 3 enjoyed some Thai food for dinner which their leader
Maggie described as “super yummy.” They are pumped to go into their third day
of serving tomorrow and to continue to build relationships with the children
and staff at FAM.
Serving
Group 4:
Samaritan
Ministries, a local soup kitchen, was the first stop for Serving Group 4 today.
The team was able to serve a large group of people and mingle with the guests
there. It was a cool experience for the team to be able to put faces to the
statistics we have been hearing about all week. After lunch, the team spent
part of their afternoon back at N.I.C.E.
The group continued to help the children at N.I.C.E. by teaching them
English and math lessons. Serving Group 4 is so excited that N.I.C.E. is the
ministry that they will be going back to everyday. The relationships they are
building with the children are so joyful and they love getting to know all
about the everyday and personal life of the kids from these refugee families.
Once their time at N.I.C.E. was done for the day, Serving Group 4 went to
Swett’s for dinner, a crowd favorite here in Nashville, where they experienced
some good Southern cooking!
Serving
Group 5:
Today was
Hunter, one of our members, birthday! Serving Group 5 was really excited to
start their day off with a fun activity most of the kids participated
in...stopping by the most hipster coffee shop in Nashville, only a few blocks
away from where we are staying. After the group got some much-appreciated
caffeine, they headed back to Project Transformation for another day of reading
with the children from under privileged neighborhoods around Nashville. It’s
crazy to see the amount of joy that comes from a simple task like reading!
After leaving Project Transformation, the group headed to Siloam, a clinic that
serves refugees in the area. The group prayed over the facility and the refugees
before beginning to unpack and organize donations. Although this was a little
task, the kids were really motivated and excited to see the task get done. To
celebrate Hunter, we followed serving by getting popsicles and exploring the
downtown Nashville scene. Serving Group 5 ended their night by experiencing
some Indian food and, although apprehensive at first, it was one of the favorite
food places they have experienced so far.
Upon return
from all the ministries, the groups gathered back at the housing site and had
their second porch time. After sharing funny “Remember That Time” stories and
some touching moments where the kids saw Jesus today, the group heard a great
message from Philippe about the things we often have to give up in order to
have a real encounter with God.
We are super
excited to see what the rest of the week has in store for us and to continue to
build relationships with the people we are working during our time in the city.
Please continue to pray that God would show up in big ways in the lives of the
kids and that they would really lean on each other and love each other well.
Pray that their dependency this week would be on God rather than the comforts
we indulge in during our daily life.
