Jesus Still Feeding the Thousands

Thanksgiving Baskets of Hope
Caring, sharing, and loving our neighbors
Click here for more photos

Our God is alive and continues to perform miracles today for the entire world to see. Thanksgiving Baskets of Hope was just one of these modern day miracles where the Lord provided for His creation through one act of faith. If you’re like me there are some historic events of the Bible that really stand out to you. For me, it’s the recording of Jesus feeding the five thousand. I love this recount because of the number of lives it impacted. Next to the idea of how crazy in love Jesus is with us, is the idea that he would use one childlike act of faith to set into motion a miracle of such magnitude that it made it into the Bible for generations to read. I believe this account is a call to all believers in Jesus Christ to apply faith into every day, in every way. This is exactly what one person, moved by the Holy Spirit, did at Urbancrest Baptist Church by initiating our “Baskets of Hope” program. 

This year we had several church congregations. These were Urbancrest Baptist Church, Iglesia Bautista Hispana de Urbancrest, Living Word Baptist Church, and Central Baptist Church. All participated in feeding those in need with an emphasis on evangelism. In total, there were about 400 families served (roughly 1,000 souls).

One Lord + one small act of faith = thousands of lives touched with the Gospel.

Thanks so very much too all the many workers who donated time, energy, talents, resources, and financial support to make this event such a success. The church acted as the Lord intended by becoming His hands and feet when they shared a love that reached way beyond a basket of food. A very special thanks to the leaders, assembly, registration, security, pastors, prayer counselors, and food carriers. We have so much to be Thankful for this year, and I am especially thankful for you.

There is more to the Great Pumpkin Give Away than getting a free pumpkin.

GreatPumpkinGiveAway_Oct13 2012

There are few who would argue that spending a crisp fall day on a farm is an enjoyable event. Urbancrest Baptist Church and Iron’s Fruit Farm have join together to provide this experience with their annual Great Pumpkin Give Away. A flurry of activity is witnessed each year as many volunteers scramble to set up a bounce house, popcorn machine, and face painting station. This year, by God’s grace, everything came together seamlessly. Many people who visited Iron’s Fruit Farm with their families participate in many of the activities and possibly left with one of the many free pumpkins. This effort is just one more way Urbancrest Baptist Church is working to engage people in our community with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

During the Great Pumpkin Give Away, 42 volunteers manned their event stations in from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. As always, face painting was a huge hit. Children showed up in droves to employ the creative abilities of the volunteers – and did they deliver! The popcorn stand and bounce house had never ending lines of children which kept their afternoon lively. Hundreds of pumpkins were given away to visiting families as one more practical way to show the love of Christ. Nearly one thousand Challenge Newspapers were distributed with the Good News of the Gospel.

One highlight of the day was watching David Cain, the Juggler for Jesus as he performed two routines packed with the salvation message. He finished by inviting the crowd to surrender their lives to Jesus Christ. We thank God for allowing us to help assist the Iron family in their Great Pumpkin Give Away. There is no question that people were impacted by the no strings attached service of our Urbancrest volunteers. If you missed the fun from this year’s Great Pumpkin Give Away, make sure you mark your calendar for next year so you won’t miss out on joining this family fun event.

Challenge the Hood: Share the Gospel, and Collect Food for the Needy!

Click Here for photos from August 22
Click Here for photos from August 29

The Challenge the Hood event is a partnership between Urbancrest Baptist Church and Challenge, the Good News Paper. This event combines collecting food for the Lebanon Food Pantry and sharing the Gospel by handing out Challenge Newspapers in conjunction with the Food Pantry collection bags.

The first Challenge the Hood took place in Garfield Park subdivision on Wednesday, August 22. Dewayne Jeffers was our host and everyone gathered at his place before going out. After prayer and some basic instructions, our team of adults, youth and children were deployed throughout the Garfield Park subdivision. Special thanks to our youth pastor, Aaron Taylor, who recruited almost 40 youth to help out! We had 2 pickup trucks cruising through “the hood” picking up the donated food. Later, teams of youth drove to the food pantry and unloaded the “bounty” of food donations.

Our second Challenge the Hood food drive was held on Wednesday, August 29 in Revere’s Run subdivision. Rhonda Kuntz hosted for her neighborhood. Once again, the youth rallied with 25-30 in attendance. These valiant “foot soldiers” knocked on resident’s doors, handed out Challenge Newspapers, and invited folks to help us by donating food goods to the Lebanon Food Pantry.

This year, Andrew Trezona from Challenge Newspaper and his family joined in this ministry endeavor. He learned first-hand how much fun and work this effort has been for us each year. During the Challenge the Hood at Revere’s Run, Pastor Tom partnered with the Trezona family by knocking on doors and sharing the Challenge Newspaper. Oh yeah, and may we go on record, that Pastor Tom flagged down the ice cream truck…and you guessed it…that team cooled off eating delicious ice cream! Hey, where’s the ice cream for the rest of the folks who served? All the other teams got were Twizzlers and cold bottled water! Guess everyone will want to be on Pastor Tom’s team next year!

A Few Testimonials
Pastor Tom and Andrew called on a family that had recently moved to Lebanon and they invited the family to attend Urbancrest. Also, one family mentioned that they could not contribute food since they were unemployed and in need of food themselves…so we gathered some emergency food the following day and Rhonda Kuntz delivered it. Praise God!

Thanks to everyone who helped us plant Gospel seeds through distributing the Challenge Newspaper that always contains the Plan of Salvation. Thanks for helping needy folks in our own community. May this serve to remind us of Jesus’ teaching: “Then the King [Jesus] will say to those on His right Hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave me food…” Matthew 25:34-35a, [NKJV]

It’s Showtime! Men and Their Shiny Polished-Steel Cars, Trucks, and Cycles!

Award for the Top 25 winners

Click Here for more Car Show photos.

Blog update: August 29, 2012

Summer Jam 2012 Tour came to a dramatic crescendo with a big crowd, roaring engines, awesome cars, free food and Gospel singing!  97 cars, trucks, and motorcycles registered for the car show, with a few more that arrived later, so we hit our goal of 100 registrants. That was my prayer… I wanted God to bring 100 vehicles. What an awesome turn out!  In addition, God truly blessed us with great weather, clear skies, and temperatures in the 70’s. That’s unbelievable weather for the month of August!

The quality and variety of cars that were entered were absolutely incredible! One winner, for example, was a Barrett Jackson car which was specially designed and created as “one of a kind” by the notorious car guy of the same name. We had some of our own UBC winners, too: Jess Wilson won a trophy for his cameo truck and Tom Leach for his 2012 Harley CVO Power-Glide motorcycle. Many UBC “car guys” brought their cars, too, so they could share their stories and testimonies with others.

We gave away 25 car award plaques, and additional trophies for motorcycles and trucks. All participants received Urbancrest Car Show magnetic dash plagues too. In addition to all this, we had drawings throughout the day and many folks were awarded additional prizes like caps, tools, Christian DVD’s, and other “guy” awards!  With all the sponsorships and donations for our concessions, we raised enough money to give $1500 to our local Lebanon Food Pantry. Barb Gregory, our UBC Food Pantry coordinator, was ecstatic!

Ellis Amburgy from UBC, who showed his 57 Chevy and “Amburgy custom truck with frame-off restoration”, partnered with me on this event. He rallied many local sponsors for donations that benefited our Lebanon Food Pantry. Thanks, Ellis, for all your hard work!

The Gospel was proclaimed three times during the show – once by Pastor Tom, then by Youth Pastor Aaron Taylor, and finally by Noel Grace. Noel showed his ‘67 Corvette and was featured in the Challenge Newspaper that was distributed during the show. Noel stepped out of the crowd to share his personal testimony and the Gospel. Join us in praying for the Holy Spirit to bring a harvest from the Gospel seeds that were planted!

All of our volunteers, like Disaster Relief leaders Wanda and Mick Lovely, deserve recognition for their hard work. Serving out of the Disaster Relief Truck, Mick and Wanda supplied coffee and pastries for our earlier arrivals that began showing up at 7:30 a.m.

 Steve and Julie Hendrix spearheaded the concessions and served free hot dogs, popcorn, and snow cones for the crowd. Them Bowman’s band entertained our crowd with many secular songs rewritten with Christian lyrics. Julie and Jim Reutener supervised the inflatable “race [obstacle] course”, Craig and Rhonda Miller took charge of the “kiddie” bounce house, Jennifer Marbach painted kids’ faces with fun designs, and Ron Turner operated the gospel “kiddie” train, along with Andrew Trezona, who partnered with me to distribute the Challenge Newspaper. Our “prayer station” was located near the concessions for a lot of walk-in business. Sandy Huddleston led the ministry in this booth where guests could visit and have prayer. She and her team prayed with the show participants, too!

I invite you to put Urbancrest’s 2nd Annual Car, Truck, and Motorcycle Show on your calendar for next year on August 17, 2013. Invite your friends, bring your family or show your own car! We’re shooting for 150-200 registrants next year. The more guests that attend, the more who hear the Gospel message!

The Car Show was a great way to conclude our Summer Jam Tour 2012 (SJT12). Thanks again to Rusty and Jill Young for helping us lead this new community outreach initiative where lives were touched by the Gospel.

I’m reminded of the power of the Gospel in what Paul shared in 1 Thessalonians 1:5, “For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, and the Holy Spirit”… We joined God in His work, proclaiming and sharing the gospel here in our community of Lebanon. May God bring a harvest of new believers!

“If you confess with your mouth that ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved!” [Romans 10:9-11]. This is good news!

Overall Winner in the Summer Jam Tour [SJT] Dog Fun Show Hard to Choose, Best Prize of All Was The Gospel!

To check out photos from Dog Fun Show, click HERE.

The Summer Jam Tour 2012 went to the dogs August 1, with a Dog Fun Show. Many families came with their best friends and over twenty-seven dogs entered the contest. There were a multitude of small dogs, some large dogs and one very large dog or maybe it was a small horse, I couldn't tell! The one thing they all seemed to have in common was how much they were loved by their families.

Everyone started to arrive about 6:00 p.m. to register for one or all of the categories. The categories included smallest dog, largest dog, best trick, best costume, and best owner/dog look alike. It was surprising to see how well behaved the dogs there were as they greeted each other. Across the street from the Dog Show we hosted a food trailer, drink station, face painting, and a small children’s bounce house. Hot dogs and chips were served along with popcorn and cold water. At the face painting station, many children had their faces painted like their favorite pet. Dogs were given “dog treats” too! That’s a first!

The judging began about 7:00 p.m. and each category of dogs was paraded before the judges. After the last category was seen the judges began deliberations while Darrell Coley, along with his dog, prayed and then shared the Gospel. God moved and blessed as two children recommitted their lives to Christ!

 Prizes awarded included gift cards to the winners from each category. Everyone who participated was entered to win additional door prizes of Summer Jam Tour t-shirts and candy.

The smallest dog was won by a tiny Yorkie-Poo named Karmen. I've never seen so many small dogs! It was the most attended category. The largest dog category should have been called the “Massive Dog Category” since the winner was a Great Dane named Hurley, and boy, was he big!

The best trick was won by Koda, an Australian Cattle Dog. Koda entertained us with a few obedience tricks. Some of the dogs had a little stage anxiety so some tricks didn't go over well. However, they were still given a hand by the crowd and a treat from their family. The best costume was won by a white Jack Russell Terrier named Natty. He was dressed as a pig while his teenage owner was dressed like a farmer. They were so cute.

 The best dog/owner look alike was Morgan and Mariah, brother and sister Siberian Huskies and their owner. All three had silver and black hair and the owner wore black and silver sunglasses that match the Huskies. It was amazing how much they looked alike...

 Oh, how we love our dogs (no offense to cat lovers!). They greet us when we come home, they comfort us when we are sick, and they make us laugh when we are feeling low. They may be a lot of work and they may get into more trouble than they should, but we love them because of the unconditional love they give us.

Even with all the love they give, it isn't enough because it is temporary. Once they are gone, we again may feel lonely, judged, and wanting for a love that will be with us forever. Jesus offers us that kind of love, an eternal love. He will love us unconditionally and all He asks is that we repent of our sins, and accept Him as our Lord and Savior. He sacrificed His life for ours. He paid the price for our sins so that we could stand before the Father, pure and with a clean heart. That is way more than what the love of a dog can ever do. Look to our Lord Jesus and you can be saved and experience His unconditional love.

Confess with you that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead and you will be saved [Romans 10:9]

Please plan to join us at our next awesome SJT ministry venue, our Car/Truck/Motorcycle Show, at Urbancrest on Saturday, August 18th from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. We will award prizes to the owners of the show vehicles and show registrants can win additional prizes too!

 We will have music by a DJ, The Bowman’s [Southern Gospel Group] and our own UBC youth praise team! Free food, our new inflatable obstacle course, and our “gospel” train ride for the kiddies will be there, too! Bring your friends!

Though we saw the storm strike, our Wiffle Ball Tournament did not strike out, it was a home run! Praise the Lord!

Due to technical difficulties, we are reposting this blog so the photo links work correctly.





For more Wiffle Ball Tournament Photos. Click Here.


Our Summer Jam Tour (SJT12) Wiffle Ball Tournament and Family Picnic started with a few weather challenges. Our first huddle was the heat index pushing 100 degrees. Then the skies opened up as a thunder storm rolled through Colonial Park North right before 6:00 p.m., sending most folks scrambling to the picnic shelter while others ran to their cars! This park was not only ideal for the games, it provided shelter from the storm as well as tables for our family picnic!

Once the storm passed, we praise the Lord, as He reminded us again of His faithfulness by blessing us with a faint rainbow in the eastern sky! Those who braved the weather then began the process of wiffle ball team selection and the games were soon under way! Denise Wilson along with Joe led our tournament games!

We had 4 total teams playing 2 games each. The winning team was determined by the overall greatest number of runs. Awesome prizes were awarded for the 1st and 2nd place teams. Each player on the 1st place team was awarded 2 tickets to the Dayton Dragon’s for their baseball games. Each player on the 2nd place team was awarded a Dayton Dragon’s baseball cap!

Most importantly, when I shared the gospel using the Evange-Cube that evening [before prizes were awarded] God moved and blessed with one teenage boy who gave his life to Christ! He was invited to the tourney by one of our UBC youth too! So inviting others is really working and God blessed!

In addition, this year we have added registration and prize drawings for all community visitors at SJT12. What a welcome surprise to our visitors whose names were drawn for Dayton Dragon tickets or baseball caps! We had our largest community attendance this year for this tournament.

Also, to encourage our UBC teens to invite their friends this year, Rusty and Jill also have a drawing for a $25 I-Tunes card entering all teens who have registered a friend they invited to our SJT12 ministry events. This drawing is offered for each SJT event this summer!

Thanks again to Denise & Joe Wilson for leading our Wiffle Ball Tournament. They did a great job! Thanks also to Sherlene for adding baked beans & chips to our menu to make this a great picnic along with the hot dogs. All of this served on a plate while folks were seated at the picnic tables.

Thanks to everyone who helped and participated in our SJT12 Wiffle Ball Tournament! Huge thanks to Rusty and Jill Young who lead this ministry!

We invite you and your friends [and your pet dogs] to our SJT12 Dog Show this week, Wednesday August 1st. Awesome prizes will be awarded to best dog costume, best tricks, funniest looking, etc. We also encourage our UBC youth to bring friends and be prepared to share the gospel through connecting with Soularium in which they have been trained earlier this year. We praise the Lord for the harvest!

Using Our Talents for God’s Glory…Summer Jam Tour 2012 Talent Showcase



Greer South Carolina mission team performing Arise My Love.

To see more photos from this and other Local Missions events, click here.

What an awesome collaborative partnership for God’s glory! Our Summer Jam Tour 2012 [SJT12]…Talent Showcase was a partnership between UBC’s youth praise team and the Greer First Baptist mission team from SC, singing, playing musical instruments, and acting out live dramas on Wednesday, June 20th at Lebanon Jr. High School. This venue was conducted outside on a beautiful but hot evening!

The mission team from Greer, SC was led by Robbie Gravely, with 50+ youth who shared their talents to give God glory and impact our community for Christ. Folks were seated on the lawn and in chairs enjoying the SJT12 talent showcase. Our UBC Youth Praise Band, which made a huge contribution of talent and time, was led by Mike Copenhaver. Our guests also enjoyed free, popcorn, popsicles, and hot dogs!

One of our community visitors that evening was a former US Olympic gold champion softball player! And how did we find this out? When a few of our UBC youth [Ella & Hazel] shared “Soularium” [connecting with others to share the gospel message] with her….she shared her story too!

To close out the evening together, the SC drama team performed “Arise My Love” as a crescendo of dramatic proportion for the evening. Then, the SC youth pastor, Ryan Holtzclaw, shared a clear and compelling message of the Gospel.

Our Summer Jam Tour 2012 [SJT12] leaders are Jill & Rusty Young and they continue to recruit for participants as well as laborers as we impact our community for Christ! Our next SJT12 ministry event is our Wiffleball Tournament and Family Picnic scheduled for Wednesday, July 25th. This will be held at Colonial Park North [off Monroe Rd.] and it begins at 6 PM!

For more SJT12 details and registration information please use our link: www.urbancrest.org/summer-jam-tour or call Jill Young @ 513.383.5893.

Please continue to pray for God to yield a harvest of new believers as we faithfully impact our community for Christ and share the gospel. See you soon at our next SJT12 ministry event!

We've "Disc-overed" Something New!

Really? No more block parties? No, …really, we don’t have block parties this year because we've disc-overed something NEW... Summer Jam Tour 2012!

We launched Summer Jam Tour 2012 [SJT12] with six great new exciting venues to reach our community for Christ. On May 30 we “soared” with our first new ministry venue, Ultimate Disc Tourney!

God blessed us with great sunny beautiful weather, 70-some degrees with a slight cool breeze. Jim and Julie Reutener [and Emily too] led this sporting event. They began with basic instructions and training drills, then teams were formed to play ultimate disc [like Frisbees advancing the discs to cross the fields and source goals as they threw and advanced the discs.

Jill and Rusty Young [along with Ella and Haze their daughters] are leading our SJT12 this year working with a core team to create our awesome community outreach for this summer. We have expanded from the neighborhoods [of our former block parties] to the community. Our goal is to engage more of our community through our local missions outreach as we share the gospel praying that many are transformed through Christ. Pray that God grants a harvest of many new believers to His Kingdom through SJT12 this summer!

We also thank our UBC Youth Praise Band [directed by Mike Copenhaver] for joining us in our collaborative partnership to reach our community for Christ! Our teens were “jamming”…sharing worship songs of praise….guess that’s one of the reasons we call it Summer “Jam” Tour huh?

Please invite your friends and neighbors to join us this summer for SJT12! You can check our website, register on-line, or invite others through Facebook.

Our next SJT event is our Talent Show, June 20th, at Lebanon Jr. High. Invite others to join us! Our UBC praise team and drama teams are participating as well our visiting mission team from Greer, S. Carolina.

Check out our website sign-ups for you as a volunteer and/or participant in our Summer Jam Tour: www.urbancrest.org/summer-jam-tour.

Pray that God does great things by adding many new believers to His Kingdom that only He can get credit for through SJT12 this summer! May our prayer request mirror the prayer request of Apostle Paul in Ephesians 6:19…that God would give us boldness to proclaim the gospel with clarity!

Soularium…it’s just Solarium without “u” [you]…building bridges!

Our Soularium training on Sunday May 6^th was truly a dynamic collaborative partnership with Brian Frye, Collegiate Ministries for State Convention of Baptists in Ohio, Pastor Aaron Taylor [our youth pastor] and me with local missions!

What an awesome time together learning to build bridges to connect with others…even total strangers... and hear some of their “personal stories”. Then we had the opportunity to share our story, our testimony of how Christ has transformed our lives. This built a bridge and connection for us to share the Good News of the gospel with others.

After a time of breaking up into small groups and gaining feedback from all attendees, we learned the 3 primary reasons why we don’t share our faith and the gospel with others:

1. Fear of rejection
2. Apathy toward others
3. Don’t know how to share one’s faith

This training was designed to help us overcome all three of these objections/fears. We partnered 1 on 1 to practice using the 48 pictures of Soularium to engage, listen, and build bridges/connections with others so we could share our story [testimony] and the Gospel.

We had over 70 attendees, foot-soldiers for Christ, who were trained and then deployed throughout Lebanon and Cincinnati Outlet Mall in Monroe. Meeting folks, sharing the Soularium pictures, listening to personal stories, and sharing their personal stories [testimonies].

The beautiful gorgeous Sunday afternoon was a blessing since so many families were enjoying picnics, parks, etc….Our foot-soldiers for Christ saturated the parks, side-walks, downtown and the outlet malls connecting with others.

As planned, we returned back to UBC to share about what God did. Youth and adults shared about how well connecting with others had gone. Everyone was excited about what God did and how they learned to build bridges with others. God even blessed when a boy prayed to accept Christ! Praise the Lord!

Our local mission strategy is to keep building on this momentum for Summer Jam Tour 2012 as our local missions outreach this summer. Check out: www.Urbancrest.org/Summer-Jam-Tour for sign-ups and details. Our vision is to deploy each person trained to use Soularium throughout our Summer Jam Tour events.

Through building this relational “bridge” using the picture stories of Soularium, folks begin to “unpack” their life story…this makes the conversation more personal and relational. Quite frankly, I was surprised what folks were sharing with me in just a few minutes. As this sharing takes place, the barriers to the gospel are reduced as we share our transformational personal stories [testimonies] and the Good News of the gospel as we share scripture.

Hebrews 4:12-13 tells us that God’s Word is powerful and effective. As we combine sharing His Word along with the work of the Holy Spirit, God begins a great work in the lives of those who need Christ.

Our 1^st Summer Jam Tour 2012 [SJT 2012] event is May 30^th, Ultimate Disc Tournament at Warren County Career Center [on 48, just north of Rt. 122].

This is a rallying cry to all of you who are now trained in building these relational bridges through Soularium... we need you to attend all Summer Jam Tour 2012 ministry events, sharing your story through Soularium. See you all there!

Below is our complete summer schedule for SJT 2012. Plan to be there, have fun, and share your faith!

Baskets of Hope Celebrates Third Anniversary at UBC

Volunteers hard at work in the gym preparing our Baskets of Hope.

“For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures…”

 [1 Cor. 15: 3-4, NKJV]

During this Easter season, we celebrate the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ -- Jesus Christ, the Hope of the Gospel! What a great time to reach out to our community through our Baskets of Hope [BoH] ministry to share this Good News of the Gospel. In addition, we blessed recipients with food to share with their families around their dinner tables while remembering Easter.

Registration is a great time to get to know new members of our community.

On Sunday evening, April 1^st , we blessed families at Urbancrest and Living Word Baptist Church, our new church plant right here in Lebanon, with our Baskets of Hope [BoH]. We celebrated our 3^rd anniversary for BoH too! We also added our third BoH service. Our Hispanic Ministry, lead by Ruben Calzado, met in room 203 where our guests worshiped and heard God’s Word in Spanish and English; this was a bilingual service!

Our UBC youth praise team led our worship time together [Thanks, Mike Copenhaver], along with our drama team. Our youth were awesome! We thank the Lord for what He is doing in their lives!

Our Youth Praise Team leading worship.

Pastor Tom shared our Easter message with great practical illustrations using his golf club. We had several respond to the Gospel invitation including five [5] who invited Christ into their lives for the first time and several others who made re-commitments or responded in another way to Gospel! Praise the Lord! Pray that these new believers connect with UBC and become Christ-like disciples serving the Lord in their ministry calling.

We served 126 families at UBC and 23 families at Living Word [our new church plant in Lebanon], for a total of 149 families! This is about twice the number of families as we served for our first Easter BoH!

Thanks BoH team for the hard work, calls, and follow-up with our BoH families to make all this possible. The preparation and distribution of our food baskets went very fast and efficiently.

Our BoH team is led by Kristy Purkey with contributing team leaders Nathan Coates, Melanie & Rob Pritchard, Cathy Dwire, Janie Caudill [lead LWBC location], and Sandy Huddleston. Photographs submitted by Dewayne Jeffers. To learn more about BoH and how you may serve in this ministry, please contact Kristy Purkey: ppkp90@embarqmail.com or 937.604.1461.  

Christmas Brings Hope to Local Families

Baskets of Hope reached a new level in Lebanon in December. Three services were held simultaneously for over three hundred families! We praise the Lord for His goodness because we know that without Him, this would not have been possible.

Under the direction of Kristy Purkey, our new BOH leader and her teams, two hundred and seventy-five families received Baskets of Hope at our UBC Christmas event on December 18. Registration team leader, Nathan Coates, reported that families started arriving well before 5 PM for our 6 PM service. The registration team handled the increased number of recipient families with efficiency, enthusiasm and warmth. Thanks, registration team, for your attitude of service!

Over 300 families attended Baskets of Hope services on December 18, 2011.

BoH guests and UBC members came together in our Worship Center to sing Christmas praise-arrangements with our choir and praise team led by Pastor Dave Bickers. A new, added dimension to our BOH service was the baptism of two people from our Thanksgiving BOH event. We all witnessed and celebrated the change that Jesus Christ has made in their lives!

 

After Pastor Tom shared a brief Christmas message from God’s Word, five guests came forward to pray with our counselors who were led by Sandy Huddleston. They invited Jesus into their hearts and lives, truly receiving the Gift of Christmas found only through trusting Christ!

 

After the service, Melanie & Rob Pritchard and our assembly team set a record time of getting all 275 families through the receiving process in 35 minutes! This included the gift area, overseen by Jessica Copenhaver, where over 400 age-appropriate gifts were distributed through the generosity of families at Urbancrest.
Thanks to everyone who stepped up to donate gifts, monies or to help wrap the gifts!



Hispanic BOH families met separately at UBC for their own service in Spanish. We assembled a bilingual team from UBC that served by sharing their testimonies, reading God’s Word, presenting the Gospel and praying, etc. in Spanish! Our Bible study leader Ruben also shared about our plans to begin Bible studies. Ruben hails from Cuba so he is fluent in Spanish and culturally relevant with the Hispanic community. The initial stage in our Hispanic Ministry strategy is to begin Bible studies in homes or apartments in order to develop connections and nurture Christ-like disciples.


Our third BOH service was at a second location in Lebanon, Living Word Bible Church, a church plant that began in September 2011. Their BOH format was very similar to the others with distribution to many families that live close by the 500 West Mulberry Street location. Exciting news: When Pastor Chris Straw gave the Gospel invitation, several guests responded by giving their lives to Christ!


Thanks to all participants for your service and partnership in our Baskets of Hope ministry which is helping so many families and changing lives for eternity as they find the true hope in Christ.


We look forward to our next BOH celebration for Easter, Sunday evening, April 1st! Please mark your calendars now and make plans to serve and join God in His mission as we share the Gospel with our neighbors in need. To serve, please contact Kristy Purkey at ppkp90@embarqmail.com.



Each Basket of Hope included ham, two cans of green beans,
two cans of corn, a gallon of milk, butter, salad, salad dressing,
boxed potatoes, cookie mix, sugar and other
trimmings for a family Christmas dinner.