Baptist Building staff breaks the bank to aid Texas hunger offering_122203

Posted: 12/19/03

Baptist Building staff breaks
the bank to aid Texas hunger offering

By Ken Camp

Texas Baptist Communications

DALLAS–Baptist Building staff recently offered hope and help to hurting people through bashed banks, bottled water and books bought for children.

Three times a year, all Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board personnel spend five days in lengthy staff meetings. But the most recent staff week included not just meetings, but also opportunities for meeting needs.

The Christian Life Commission, Woman's Missionary Union of Texas and Texas Baptist Men gave employees the chance to participate in a variety of mission-action projects during staff week.

Chip Kingery of ProVision Asia, Jana Whitworth of Dallas Baptist Association, Joyce Gilbreath of the Christian Life Commission, BGCT Executive Director Charles Wade and CLC Director Phil Strickland examine a pile of money donated by Baptist Building employees.

Several weeks ago, staff received plastic “rice bowl” banks from the Christian Life Commission, along with encouragement to fill the banks for world hunger.

Then the commission hosted a “rice bowl demolition” event at the Baptist Building. Various offices were asked to group themselves into five-person teams, adopting names like “Bowl Weevils” and “Mommas Against Hunger.” Teams were given hammers to break their banks, and then they raced to count out the pennies, nickels, dimes and dollars scattered on the floor.

The Texas Baptist Offering for World Hunger received $1,105.76 from the effort.

Chip Kingery of ProVision Asia, a Christian economic development ministry in India, and Jana Whitworth, community ministries associate for Dallas Baptist Association, expressed appreciation for what those dollars will mean in neighborhoods around the Baptist Building and on the other side of the globe.

“It was fun for us all. But the best part is that there will be people who will live and have a chance to thrive who would not have, but for this offering,” BGCT Executive Director Charles Wade wrote in an e-mail to staff after the event.

The last day of staff week was devoted to spotlighting the ministries of Texas WMU and Texas Baptist Men, and Baptist Building employees participated in learning activities that benefited several related missions projects.

Employees bought bottles of water for $1 each, and proceeds went to “Pure Water, Pure Love,” a ministry to provide Southern Baptist missionaries with water purifiers or water purification kits. The effort raised $271, more than enough to buy a water purifier for one missionary family.

Baptist Building staff members also brought 69 children's books, 23 audiocassette tapes and 122 padded mailers for the Texas WMU Story Book Project, as well as contributed $50 toward the emphasis.

The restorative justice ministry project enables the child of an incarcerated woman to hear his or her mother's voice reading a bedtime story. The mother in prison reads a children's book aloud, records the story and then sends the book and tape to her child.

Staff members also prayed for specific missions needs and ministries, wrote 71 notes of encouragement to directors of Christian Women's Job Corps sites throughout Texas and shopped for Christmas gifts in the World Crafts catalogue. Baptist Building staff spent close to $200 on WorldCrafts, an economic development project of WMU.