Mission to Hispanic Families
Written: 9/22/2009 by Rev. Sherrill Corson
"When was I hungry and you gave me food...?"
In one week's time, generous quantities of food were received and distributed on Sunday, September 20th, in response to a critical need for food among our Hispanic brothers & sisters residing in a trailer park north of Wedowee. This trailer park has been the focus of outreach and ministry by persons of the Southeast District. The food distribution was a connectional outreach endeavor of FUMC (Roanoke), FUMC (Wedowee), FUMC (Wadley), Ava, Midway, and New Home.
The ladies of the trailer park organized this event which provided an "encounter with the Holy" as all went to serve as the hands & feet of Christ. The event was a time of glorious fellowship, prayer, a message of the Word, and tearing down of cultural barriers as more than 50 families within the park received the blessing of food for their otherwise empty tables.
The "next step" prayer is to establish and support a food pantry of culturally appropriate foods in cooperation with New Home UMC (located in close proximity to the trailer park), to assist persons to locate sustainable work, and to potentially become the site of a new bilingual UM church plant for the Southeast District. This need was expressed by the 25-30 women of the park who are now meeting weekly with Pastor Sherrill Corson (FUMC Wadley / Almond UMC) for Bible study and prayer.