 One Great Hour of Sharing – Let Love Flow
Nobody hungry, nobody thirsty, shade from the sun, shelter from the wind, For the Compassionate One guides them, takes them to the best springs.” – Isaiah 49:10 Every day and every week, we see our congregation giving tirelessly to reach out to meet critical needs of neighbors in our community. Less visible to most of us, but equally important, is to work with Our Church’s Wider Mission to allow congregations and individuals to meet people at points of critical need in their lives. During the month of March, we encourage our church members to support the UCC Special Mission Offerings for One Great Hour of Sharing which provides resources to reach out in places lacking health and educational resources and/or where disaster has struck. Here are a few examples of how your support can make such a difference in peoples’ lives. Water is life, water is love - Access to clean fresh water is vital for all of humanity, but for women in particular, water access means the difference between life and death for them and their families. The United Nations International Observance of World Water Day (March 22) reflects on the importance of water in our daily lives and remembers those who lack access to adequate drinking water supplies. For women and girls around the world, it can be a 12 hour walk to the nearest water source to collect water to maintain basic needs and crucial hygiene practices during the COVID-19 pandemic. With your support,100 families will benefit from the Water Well project, sponsored by the United Church of Christ in Mozambique (UCCM). When you give to One Great Hour of Sharing, you invest in the hopeful future of women and girls around the world and serve as co-workers with God to build a just world for all. Food security – Imagine not knowing where your next meal will come from, living in constant fear of political unrest, battling climate change, farmers battling obstacles to get crops to harvest. For many people in the world, this is their reality. In Nicaragua, families find it harder to believe that food security can be an attainable goal. Several of the families there have lost several harvests to the effects of climate change. Farmers in their community found that when it rains too much, the crops die from disease or are washed away. When it doesn’t rain enough, they dry up. Either way, farmers lose everything. Through One Great Hour of Sharing programs, farmers and their families are finding new ways to earn a living and secure their food supply, such as raising stingless Melipona bees, which produce medicinal honey to sell or raising poultry that produce eggs, plus another 140 chickens to sell! Your Board of Mission urges you to join in Our Church’s Wider Mission give generously to One Great Hour of Prayer which helps people in such need to imagine and attain a better life, with clean water, better sanitation, and secure food systems. You may make your gift any time during the month of March by indicating "OGHS" in the memo line of your check or online gift. For more information about how to give to and through First Congregational, please click here. Comments are closed.
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