Watching People Grow

Melanie Bell is a young mother. She is a member of the local elementary school PTA. Her husband is a police officer in Hurst. Chris Banks is our Director of Education (lay person). Leah Perricone is our custodian and Middle School Sunday School teacher.

In our January planning meeting, Chris told a story about how two children came to a Wednesday night worship looking for a meal. We used to serve meals on Wednesday nights a couple of years ago. They came back on a Sunday morning, again hungry. Melanie had heard a story while on her pilgrim Walk to Emmaus how a church was providing weekend snack packs. She took the initiative after hearing Chris sharing the information. She approached the principal at the local elementary and then approached me about starting a program here. She spoke to the UMW and received strong support. She approached the other two elementary schools in Watauga. She applied for and received a grant from the Missions Support at our Conference Support. She applied for and received a grant from our local SERTOMA club as well.

Over the last 10 weeks of the 2013-2014 school year, we served on average 120 children per week. Melanie also enlisted help from Keller Community Storehouse for one of the schools (Whitley Road Elementary is in the KISD). More importantly, through Melanie, our church was energized in donating the food. The money we have received in grants still is in tact because enough food has been donated. Melanie took the opportunity as volunteers came to pack the snack packs to provide for devotion time and prayer time; thus building a small group ministry out of this outreach opportunity.

Leah and Melanie have known each other since they were children going to school in this area. Leah has jumped in to this ministry with both feet. She and Melanie have become equal partners, visioning and working together.

In addition, our people were asking about feeding the children during the summer months. Through Melanie's and Leah's efforts, in conjunction with the City of Ft Worth, our church became a distribution center for the City of Ft Worth Summer Food program. Melanie recruited volunteers for this effort. Although we didn't receive very many children, our volunteers have grown closer to each other. We are looking at ways to be more appealing to the community next summer, including working with the Watauga Recreation Center.

For the 2014-2015 school year, Melanie is working with First Bapist of Watauga to take on one of the elementary schools, linking arms with the Body of Christ in our community.