We partner with the Volunteers of America to provide shelter to the homeless. This week is a successful ministry only with dedicated volunteers from King's Grant. Sign ups have gone well, so remember your day and assignment and al will go smoothly!

1. Suppers: Classes are lined up to provide the evening meal; sign ups will allow us to know who is available to join the responsible class. Guests arrive at 9:00, eat and visit until lights out at 11:00.

2. Breakfasts: Cooks arrive around 4:30am and serve the meal around 5:30, for the guests to leave by 6:00.

3. Overnight: Men of King's Grant need to step up to sleep over at the church; cots are provided. Although the VOA staff is present and awake all night, our men provide some security.

4. Medical Appointments: Doctors and nurses are key to checking our guests; regular folks are needed to help secure paperwork and be hospitable.

5. Welcome Kits: These kits are assembled before guests arrive; then each guest gets a kit with personal and hygiene items to make their stay more comfortable.

6. Hospitality Team: These people will arrive a little early each night and greet our guests as they arrive and offer to serve them during the meal.

7. Lunches: This team will assemble sack lunches for the guests to take with them as they leave at 6:00 am each morning.

We also provide a Bible study each evening and provide various evenings with entertainment. This is an opportunity to "do unto the least of these."

Our winter shelter ministry was uniquely blessed this year to house 90 or more people on four of the 7 nights. Due to the snow on Friday night and most of the day on Saturday, we were able to open the church all weekend so that anyone that came Friday night were able to stay all day Saturday and Sunday. This was greatly appreciated by our guests as it gave many of them a warm place to catch up on their rest. Normally they leave our church by 6:15 AM and are pretty much on their own all day until they return at 9PM. Many passed the weekend by watching movie videos, playing cards or reading. Some commented on how they felt God's hand in that they were at our church for the snow storm. We had plenty of food and extra volunteers came in over the weekend. Everything went smoothly throughout the week and on the last night our church was presented with a large thank your card signed by all as a gesture of appreciation. 

Blair

A Wonderful Week of Ministry...

I would like to take this opportunity to share what happened here at King's Grant during Winter Shelter week. It ran so smoothly and with so many volunteers, it could have gone unnoticed if not for this posted information. Sunday School classes volunteered to provide evening meals and hot breakfasts each day. Many children participated by drawing godly messages on dinner placements.

Our guests arrived Wednesday January 28 at around 9:00pm and all appeared to be glad to be at King's Grant Baptist. Several of our guests mentioned how much they like coming to our church particularly and all were very appreciative especially due to the condition of the economy this year.

For the week we averaged about 65 per night and many had been to our church before, several had been to our church many times. All went well that night as guest were fed a hot meal and found their way to the various Sunday School rooms to bunk in for the week. 

Janice Barber had a Bible study at 10 PM in the library as she did every night. In fact, the first thing the first guest said to me was, "Is that lady going to do the Bible study this year?"

Although we could not do a "start to finish" super bowl party as we had hoped, thanks to the big screen and the competitiveness of the game, Super Bowl night was great (we had the students' eight foot wide screen and the PA system, it was almost like being in Tampa for the game).

Our big night was Saturday when we grilled steaks for our guests (compliments of Jim Cummings) and had violin music provided by a group of young people led by Sue Schreck, a member of KGBC. Many of our youth acted as servers and the guests loved it. After dinner on Saturday night, a bingo game was held with gifts of clothing and gift certificates for food.

Tuesday night was the birthday party for anyone having a birthday that year! Gifts of wool hats and scarves were given out (compliments of the King's Stitchers) and 10-ride bus passes were given to anyone who could use them.

Throughout the week many people helped by:

• Donating needed items (the congregation)
• Spending the night (two men per night)
• Preparing and serving the meals which include a hot breakfast and home-cooked dinner every day, coordinated by Linda Shull and Bobbi Rush
• Making bag lunches which were given out every day
• Interacting with and praying with the guests led and coordinated by our very own prayer warrior Janice Barber
• Providing health and comfort kits which are given to each guest coordinated by Cheryl Douglas (a tireless worker)
• Cleaning the SS rooms early Sunday morning getting ready for Sunday School
• Purchasing clothing and gifts (Dan Chambers and Cheryl Douglas)

All in all it was a great week, no real problems and a lot of love given and given back. I sense that our guests really know they are welcome here, and many look forward to walking in our doors.

Sincerely, Blair Dunlap