Outside The Walls

What a week this has been! Thursday through Saturday we had a Disaster Preparedness seminar at our church. We were trained in areas from mass feeding to water purification. About 140 people attended, 64 of which were from our church. Now that we are trained, we could be called to serve in any part of the country and even overseas should a disaster occur.

Guess what I trained in. Mass Feeding. I know. You have heard me lament about how I hate to cook. You might even fear for the lives of those who would have to eat my cooking! Don't worry. They have their own recipes! And, all I handled was cutting the garlic bread. Relieved now?

The portable kitchen they brought to our church can feed 20,000 people a day. To practice, we cooked for those who attended the seminar. Can you imagine 15 women in a kitchen about eight feet wide and 50 feet long? Actually it went great. Everyone had their job to do and did it well.

If I had to do in my kitchen what we did over the weekend, we would never eat! We had to wash down everything, then sanitize it. All the utensils had to be sanitized. If you went from one station to another, you had to rewash your hands for 20 seconds and put on new rubber gloves. Once I touched my hat and had to go back through the washing hands process again. It's for sure the health department would be more apt to shut down my kitchen at home sooner than they would theirs! Hey, that's an idea. Maybe I'll invite the health department over. If they shut me down, Wayne will have to take me out to eat EVERY meal!

These few days have prepared our church body to minister to our community should there be disasters such as fires or earthquake.

One of the things the team said they heard all the time was, "Why are you doing this? Why would you want to help us?" Now isn't that a wide open door to sharing the love of Jesus?!!

Think about involving yourself in some kind of community effort. Get outside the walls of your church. Minister to those you are trying to reach. Let them know you love them and care for them and watch the doors of sharing your faith open wide!

Preparing myself for ministry outside the walls of our church, Gloria