The 4th of July. A church parking lot. Bottles of water. Popcorn. Church members. The community. And an idea. What is the connection between all of these things?
Love God…. Love People. This is a phrase we use frequently here at FBCW. It’s easy to love God and love people in our church building. We love our Pastor, we love all of our ministers, we love our Sunday School teachers, we love each other. The question is, do we show that same love to our community?
It came to our attention that the church parking lot has become a favorite place for families to gather to watch the Wentzville 4th of July fireworks display. Our Senior Sunday School Class decided we would like to pass out bottles of water not only to our church members but those from the community who come to enjoy the fireworks as well. What started out being just bottles of water available turned into a multi-class partnership. One of the “younger” adult Sunday School classes heard we were going to do this and asked if they could partner with us on the project. Pretty soon other ideas were discussed and as a result we decided to give away popcorn with the water. This one simple suggestion turned into a project by the two classes. Labels were made to attach to the water bottles with the FBCW logo and website info as well as scripture and gospel literature available. Young and old gathered together to put the labels on the water bottles and get ready for the event.
A table was set up at the door with the water and popcorn and some of our classmates walked around the parking lot to the various groups gathered and handed out the water and popcorn. More than 100 bottles of water were passed out and almost as many bags of popcorn. If anyone had any questions about becoming a Christian, there were plenty of people there to talk to them. If they just wanted to know more about our church, those questions could be answered as well. Most of all, we just wanted everyone to feel welcome and know that we truly do (here is that phrase again) Love God….Love People.
We felt it was important to show our community we do love them and not just those who attend our services on Sunday morning.
As Christians, we must always remember that non-believers are always watching us. And, it is our hope that someone on our parking lot on the 4th of July saw something different about us and will have a desire to know what that something is. Jesus said in John 4:10: “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water”(NLT). Let us look for opportunities to tell others who Jesus is. Hopefully they will also learn to Love God…Love People.