Partnering with Dramatic Flair to Win Souls For Christ

Over the summer, Leah Busick and our Reality Youth Drama Team partnered with UBC local mission's work and with Chris Straw in our local church plant, Living Word Bible Church. In the blog today, Leah shares her team's experiences with us.

"Our drama team likes to get outside the four walls and we certainly had a chance this summer working with the Block Party Team and the LWBC church plant team!"

"We were also busy this summer at local Back Yard Kids Clubs. Thirteen Drama Team members were in Hunter's Run neighborhood on June 26-28 with around thirty-five kids. The team then had the opportunity to share a drama sketch at the Block Party."

"August 10-12 found twelve members of the team at Cedarbrook Campground with many visitors both children and adults. The group shared the Gospel and told Bible histories, including the healing of the Centurion's servant and Moses and the Israelites escaping Egypt. They played games such as "Chicken on a Roof" and "Mosquito Tag" and did more sticky foam crafts than could be counted. The Gillens joined in the fun at both the campground and the Block party by making necklaces for everyone with individual names on a grain of rice."

"But the most important even of the summer was that six people turned their lives over to Jesus for the first time. What a fantastic time to celebrate what the Lord has done for all of us!"

Thanks to the teens and adult leaders who added so much to our Block Parties and Back Yard Kids Clubs. Their enthusiasm and apparent love for Jesus Christ was refreshing and a great asset in every circumstance.

Next week's blog will cover our Challenge the Hood event for 2011 and the neighbors who made a difference in their neighborhoods this summer.

Bacon and pancakes during church services-----Awesome!

Imagine the tantalizing smell of bacon in the air along with the smoke of a campfire on a Sunday morning, enjoying God’s creation before heading to church at Urbancrest with your family…

Sound like something your family would enjoy? Well, we have great news for you!

While most folks were getting prettied up for Sunday school and worship services this summer, UBC teams served up food and the Gospel on Sundays at 8:30 AM on June 5 & 19, July 10 & 24, and most recently August 14, at a beautiful campground called Cedarbrook – located less than a quarter mile from downtown Lebanon – the closest campground to Kings Island in southwest Ohio!

Terri Lipot leads our Cedarbrook ministry, Kim Gidley coordinates the breakfast and Beth Irons assists Kim and takes photos. These UBC teams typically have 10-16 volunteers. The devotions and gospel have been shared by Jeff Lipot, David Gidley, and Kirby Hamblin.

Up to twenty guests per breakfast have enjoyed chowing down on bacon and pancakes. We had a great time serving up food for the soul with the gospel, along with food for the belly. God blessed with at least 4 professions of faith this summer too!

And if you don’t get a move on… you’ll miss being a part of our Sunday breakfast team for August 28 – our last scheduled Sunday AM service at Cedarbrook this year! Please contact Jeff and Terri Lipot immediately at jlipot@embarqmail.com, 513.897.2335 or contact, Mike Wright, UBC local mission strategist at 513-932-4405 or mwright@urbancrest.org.

Faith Build 2011 Update

After 2 delayed deployments, some of our UBC volunteers for Habitat for Humanity served at the Lebanon build site on Saturday, July 30th. After the scorching heat, it finally rained on Friday night, July 29th, but that was good-news, bad-news for us on Saturday. It was a bit cooler, but the building site was a muddy mess!

 

The team, along with home-owner Randy Fields and his nephew Joshua, slipped and slid in the mud, but got to the basement with its poured side walls and began to work. (For photos of progress on this build project, go to http://www.habitat-tristate.org/Gallery.aspx and click on Faith Build – 7/16/2011)

 

During our scheduled half-day we:

• Cleaned out the basement area, removing large chunks of concrete by putting them into a bucket, pulling the bucket up the walls, and then dumping the contents in a sink hole.
• Covered the poured basement walls with a thin layer of insulation
• Attached the base “green” boards to the basement walls with washers and nuts
• And secured the floor joists, spanning the basement from one side wall to the other.

Each Saturday, another Habitat team will continue where we left off working on Randy’s home until it is completed.

 

Danny Mitchell will be working with the Habitat coordinator to schedule more UBC folks to help with this build in October. For more information, contact Danny Mitchell at mitchdj@go-concepts.com or 513-282-6397.

What a great way to end our year of Block Parties! The streak of 17 straight days of 90 degrees or over was broken! The skies cleared from the rain, the temperature dropped just a bit, and we were able to have our final Wednesday Block Party at East Ridge and Deas Dr.! Our new kiddie train, once again, was a great hit for the kids!

We had about 60 residents and only 27 UBC workers….but we had a great time. One neighbor was so enthusiastic that she called UBC and offered her help at the block party. She showed up early and helped set up equipment!

This neighborhood location was conducive to our ongoing strategy to partner with Living World Bible Church, Chris Straw and his core team. Chris shared the gospel at the Block Party, and we had 7 responses, 1 of these for salvation!

Since Kelli Hundley and Deanne Clem announced they will be stepping aside as leaders for our Block Party team, we need some new folks to step forward soon so we can plan for 2012. Now is the time to evaluate what went well this year, and what needs to be changed to improve the experience of our guests at our Block Parties next year. Please contact Mike Wright, mwright@urbancrest.org or call me @ 932-4405 ext 32.