An Amazing Story and the Launch of a Campaign
I’m going to give you the short version of some very good news and then I’m going to give you the longer version. In both cases, I am inviting you to be part of a big, wonderful thing God is doing.
Short Version
Thanks to the initiative of the two dear people you see above, the Sisters of the Precious Blood have agreed to give the East Dayton Fellowship $150,000 (!!) to help us renovate our badly dilapidated kitchen. This will enable us to go on serving the many thousands of needy people we’ve been feeding each year in partnership (especially) with the Food for the Journey Project. After receiving two bids for the work and consulting with knowledgeable friends, we know we need to raise a total of $300,000 to get the job done right. This means that the Sisters’ commitment has us half-way to that goal already! We never would have imagined such a figure was possible… but we see God moving and want to invite you to help complete the good work begun. You can do that by going to the new capital campaign page on our website and clicking on the link there to give.
East Dayton Fellowship - CAPITAL CAMPAIGN
Longer Version - The Good Stuff!
God’s no’s are as good as his yes’s. Sometimes we see why God tells us no on some particular occasion. We see the better thing God has mind, or why our request, if granted wouldn’t have actually been good for us. Many times, however, we can’t fathom why God would not answer an ardent, well-meant prayer with yes. In those cases, we trust he is working and that, in the age-to-come, we will see the grand design of his goodness fully realized. Recently, though, we at EDF got to find out - here and now - why God had recently given us a significant no. It turns out he was setting up a much bigger and better yes. I want to tell you that story and invite you to be part of God’s yes.
The two women you see at the top of this newsletter are Sister Jean Renee Hoying (very recently deceased) of the Sisters of the Precious Blood and her dear friend Nancy Frank. These friends basically operated for years like a super-hero duo here in Dayton! They went around together constantly doing good all over town - at multiple churches, in multiple ministries. A warehouse ministry supplying people in need with furniture for free? They’d help get it going and lug stuff around while they were at it! A ministry caring for the babies of drug addicted mothers? They’d help raise funds, raise awareness, hold those babies, and do anything else necessary to see it succeed. Feeding homeless and needy people all over Dayton - they’d join Food for the Journey Project (including here at EDF) and cook, clean, and serve till all the hungry were fed. That’s who these two women are - one still with us and one, shockingly, gone home to be with Jesus!
These two friends have been volunteering here on Fridays with FJP helping feed the hungry. They both are kind, joyful, and genuine servants. You have to be to help cook 25,000 meals in a single year (600+ on certain Fridays) using this kitchen that is, quite literally, falling apart. The electric goes out when you plug too much in, plumbing backs up, the sinks are not deep enough to wash the big dishes, and we are using residential grade equipment for commercial scale needs. These two dear people - and all of FJP - have been great sports about the kitchen here, but we have really needed a new one for quite some time. In fact, our ability to continue this ministry is threatened by the kitchen’s bad and worsening state.
So, our two sisters were thrilled when they heard we were selected as finalists for a grant from the Sisters of the Precious Blood that might give us $100,000 to renovate the kitchen. When we didn’t quite make the cut - when we got that no - we were, of course, disappointed. We’d done some back of the envelope math and thought that $100,000 would have just about got us the kitchen we need. So, when we got that no we wondered why, and we wondered what we would do.
A few months back, our two sisters said they wanted to have a sit-down meeting with me (pastor Zach) and Chuck Wourms (head of FJP). I wondered what in the world it could be about! When we sat down, they told me they wanted to know if it would be ok by us if they approached the Sisters directly and asked them to forget the grant and just give us the money to do the kitchen. I was bowled over and profoundly grateful and, of course, I said yes!
I was even more amazed when they got in touch with me, a month or two after that, to tell me they’d met with the head of the order and the Sisters had agreed to give us $150,000 toward a new kitchen! I cracked a grin so wide on that phone call it almost hurt. How good God is! And how like him to work through his people like this!
As we set about consulting with contractors and getting bids (we have two bids in so far), we realized something…Our back of the envelope math had been way off. To do what we need to do on the kitchen and to get code compliant on a bunch of stuff that the city will insist on once we open this can of worms, we have come to realize that we will need around $300,000. Learning that, we now thank God that he told us no initially! Thank God we didn’t get that first grant and find out, after the fact, that we were in no position to do what we needed to do!
God told us that no so he could set us up to do this thing the right way. The Sisters have us half-way to the real amount already in one big swoop! Now we’ve already begun looking into some other grants to help raise the remainder, but we are sure that part of how God is going to do this - part of how God’s yes is going to unfold - will be through all of you - our prayer partners, friends, donors, and companions.
We’re officially launching a capital campaign to cover the kitchen renovation and associated upgrades to our building. And we’re asking you to consider giving to that campaign using our online giving tool and selecting the “capital campaign” option from the drop-down menu provided.
That dilapidated kitchen you see above prepared more than 30,000 meals total last year (25,000 by FJP)! That’s in a church with an average attendance in the 40’s! We saw more than 3000 people through the clothing closet last year, more than 3000 through the pantry (which is separate from FJP’s meal ministry). There were recovery groups breaking bread, NA fundraisers with food, community events held over meals, and a weekly community breakfast prior to every Sunday service. Thousands and thousands fed and welcomed in the name of Jesus here in a single year. For that to continue and, we hope, grow, we need a kitchen that can handle it. Perhaps you can help us get there? Perhaps you can be a part of the big YES that God has gotten rolling through Sister Jean Renee and Nancy and the Sisters of the Precious Blood. We can’t wait to see it all come together!
To give, go to our capital campaign website and click the appropriate link.
Got any questions for us? Email us at eastdaytonfellowship@gmail.com or call us at 937-234-7028.
