What are you doing for others?
In 1957, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered a speech in Montgomery, Alabama which he declared, “Life’s more persistent and urgent question is: ‘What are you doing for others?””
That is something our denomination, church and youth group strongly live by, that we should constantly be striving to make a difference and serve our fellow man. So for the 5th year in the row, our 5-12th grade students got together on MLK Day, Monday, January 22nd to serve their local community on their day off from school.
There was much anticipation whether our service project was even going to happen. With it raining all day Sunday and then the temperature dropping over night, ice was a big concern…and rightly so. But the road were well attended to (thank you Falmouth DPW) and we were able to serve like we had planned. Everyone arrived at the Falmouth Service Center (FSC) at 9:00 am. We received a personalized tour from Warehouse Manager and John Wesley UMC Member, Matt O’Connor. It was interesting to hear how services had picked up over the past few weeks because of the government shutdown. Because of the increase in donations and aid, we had a busy morning before us.
Our team split into two groups for various different projects. Similar to last year, one group was responsible for repackaging large dog food donations into smaller gallon-size packages. The trickiest part was not getting kibble all over the floor when dumping the gigantic bags into the bins. The other group was responsible for checking expiration dates on recent food donations and sorting them in donation type. This was a challenging task because “expired” food still has a shelf life. Pretty interesting stuff actually. When both teams were done with those tasks some of them repackaged carrots, cleaned the pantry shelves and broke down boxes. Our group managed to accomplish all of the projects in record time!
Because it was too cold to be outside for a long time, we didn’t pick up trash along Gifford Street. But we were happy to see how it is still being maintained ever since our big clean-up last year. Our group took advantage of being in a new environment to play hide-and-seek and other games. The coolest part was learning how to use the Pallet Jack. Some of our students are naturals!
We love how our students thoroughly enjoy getting together to serve our community…it’s all we could hope for in our next generation.
Thank you to Matt O’Connor for facilitating all of the projects at the Service Center and Karyn Briggs for serving alongside our group.
Click here to view more photos from the day.