As you can imagine being a church, Christmas is a busy time. One of the things we do is give out Christmas Love Boxes to people we know in our town that have had a bereavement through the year, a hard time in any way or worked very hard in some area and we as the church just want to bless them at this time of the year. The boxes are made up with basic grocery supplies and as many typically Christmas themed items we can obtain. People in our parish contribute to the 'store' throughout the year and although we give out food boxes to people during the year as we are aware of the need, the end of year boxes are a big 'drive'. Over the last three years the Lions of Tirau have also given us some boxes of items they have collected from their members at monthly meetings.
One of the wonderful aspects of my job in the business of the season is to deliver these boxes that a group of people have helped to make up. We have in the past given out 8 to 10 but with the help of the Lions that number has increased over the last few years and 2011 saw us blessing 17 homes in the town.
One of the local 'free' newspapers The Matamata Chronicle did an article on this project and it was published this week with a photo of Mark Sutherland, the Tirau Lions President and myself.
Unfortunately the photo in the article hasn't saved with the newspaper link but they emailed me a copy.
And as it says some people are completely overcome with emotion when they receive these 'gifts' but I too am filled with joy at seeing and knowing how we have contributed into their lives at this time of the year.
It is indeed better to give than to receive
In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must
help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It
is more blessed to give than to receive.’
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