Once again we split into two groups. We had a group of 5 that wanted to help package food and the rest of the group went to the neighborhood to pick up trash. The group that packaged, did about 20 boxes!
A group called Life Grillers made us hamburgers and hot dogs for lunch. They were great.
There was one more shift to package food, after lunch and there was a big group of volunteers coming in from a different church. They hit the 50,000 meal goal! While they were working, we were at another church in town setting up an assembly line for stop light ministry bags.
After we got back, we had a debrief of the week with the KCDC leader and some of the adults went out to do some homeless outreach while the rest of us watched a movie and had popcorn. This was a new experience for all of us, except the KCDC leaders. We drove around industrial areas of Kansas City looking for homeless camps. We saw where many shanties had been recently destroyed by the city, their way of evicting the homeless. We had food and hygiene products to hand out, but most people we talked to were equally happy to have someone to listen to them, or to give them an encouraging word, as they were to receive anything we had for them. But I was most surprised to see the KCDC staff and volunteers taking notes with the intention of returning to these areas, calling people by their name, and attempting to meet needs. Ministering to the homeless is tricky because often times what we think they need is not what they want. So they were interested in finding out how they wanted to be helped. The end goal of course is to show them that God loves them, and hope that they will eventually give their lives to Christ.