Food For Thought

From Jim Gehman, Assistant Lay Leader

I’ve used the title of this article before. I just want you to think of our outreach programs here at LPCUMC involving FOOD. Today I’m focusing on our involvement with Opportunity House, located at 420 North 2nd Street in Reading. Opportunity House provides an evening meal 365 days a year to people in need of a hot dinner.

Our involvement with this program is to provide a meal six times a year. Simple math says that if all the churches and other agencies who contribute meals donate the same number of meals as us, then 60-some agencies are involved. Providing six meals a year certainly is not an overwhelming number, but it does demand some planning and preparation by a small number of our church family.

Currently, we rely on and thank Alan Koeble for determining a menu, developing a food list, and directing our committee on how to prepare the meal. Additional volunteers travel to Opportunity House to help serve the meals. The range of meals served number from 50 to 80 depending on the month of the year and the temperature on the day.

For those of us who are involved, this project is heartwarming and gratifying. We’ve been able to fund this project because of our faithful church family. Your contributions have allowed us to pay for food products without having to ask our finance committee for funding. Hopefully, this tradition will continue.

I encourage you to join the Opportunity House committee and experience the gratification of providing and serving a warm meal to some of the needy people in the Reading area.