This morning Craig talked about spending less – so that you can give more. He mentioned a few ways that FN is doing that as a church, particularly the KIC (Saturday cleaning) team and the Christmas offering. The KIC team is a familiar concept to many of us; for several years now, volunteers have cleaned our building every weekend, and we give the money saved on a cleaning service to mission work (you can see where the money goes by looking at the ‘mission wall’ in the glass lobby). If you’re interested in the KIC team and missed the table this morning, you can email David Holsted.
However, as I listened to him talk about the Christmas offering, I thought that some of you might like a little more of the story about the causes that the Christmas offering is going toward. He told us that the money is going 3 places:
1. KAA camp scholarships for NLR STEP students. KAA is a sister camp to Kanakuk in southern Missouri; both are high-energy Christian adventure camps with lots of activities and sports. The cost of KAA is far less for a camper because the camp is sponsored by donors – kids can come to KAA for a week for just $150. However, this is still out of reach for many families, so STEP offers scholarships – we’d like to fund 30 of those as a church this year.
KAA is such a great camping experience. Our own middle and high school students went last June, and you can read about their week here.
2. The Back Porch at Castle Bluff. Castle Bluff is adding a new lodge right where the rappelling deck was, and Fellowship North would like to put the back porch on it. You can read more about the project as a whole (and donate individually if you want). We’re looking forward to what this building – and it’s porch – will mean for the continuing ministry at this beautiful camp.
3. The Love and Hope Children’s Home in Orissa, India. This is a brand new connection for FN, made through Walt and Annie Manis – who FN supports in their work with GemStone Media. A woman from Walt and Annie’s church is the one who originally began this orphanage, a refuge for children of murdered Christians during violence that happened in Orissa in 2008. Walt and Annie’s church support this orphanage, and Walt went to Orissa to film the story of this orphanage. You can read his account of that here (and if you are diligent, you can figure out from that post how to watch the beautiful video he made about this place).
We are so happy to have the opportunity to join into this work, this year at Christmas. I hope these things are encouraging to you as you try to figure out spend less, give more.
Sarabeth Jones
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This Christmas season at FN, we’ve decided to join into the Advent Conspiracy. As a part of celebrating together, we’ve asked several people to write about each week’s topic here on our blog. And we’d like for you to join in too: share your reactions, plans, or experiences in the comments. Or, if you post on your own blog, leave a link in the comments. Post pictures to our Facebook wall. Tweet us @fellowshipnorth. Let’s use our online space as a community – one that will conspire together this Christmas season!
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