My church has done the Faith in Action model for the past few years.  We close our doors for one Sunday and go out into the community to serve.  Last year my husband and I signed up to help clean some local trails.  What a great way to serve the Lord, fellowship with other members of our church we had never met and be the hands and feet of Christ!  A few churches in our area partnered together over one weekend so it was amazing to see thousands of people wearing our service T-shirts across the county.  Our community was able to see first hand our Faith in Action and it was a wonderful way to witness!

What’s your story?

2009 will be Red Fork COG’s third time having a major Faith In Action Sunday.  Every year, FIA gets bigger and bigger.  Our first Faith In Action was a huge eye-opener to our church family, and from that one day of service a passion was lit in the hearts of our congregation that still drives us today. 

We started in 2007 by handing out doughnuts at the intersection near our church, revitalizing the front entrance of the local elementary school our church sponsors, giving free car washes at two locations, cleaning up garbage at a nearby shopping mall, our older participants made quilts and crafts and held a service at a local retirement center, and we even helped a family put siding on their house! 

In 2008, we expanded our projects to include a blood drive, volunteering at the Children’s Hospital, serving local Firefighters lunch, several major yard projects, painting at the school, and gutter cleanup. 

We also added a FIA Micro in the Fall of 2008 where we revisited the Children’s Hospital, sang Christmas Carols to the residents of a local retirement center, raked a mountain of leaves, served lunch to the local Police Department, and put together crafts.

We’re shaping our 2009 campaign as I write this.  This year’s campaign is called T09ETHER (spelled with 09 for obvious reasons) and we are focusing on bringing other groups within the community into our efforts to BE THE CHURCH.  Our FIA day is May 3rd 2009 and is sure to be bigger and better than any FIA we’ve ever had before. 

If you’d like to catch some of the stuff we’ve done in the past, you can view our FIA Online Headquarters at redforkcog.com

Thanks for the encouragement! Its great to see how other churches have had such success with FIA! We are just beginning!
Pastor Mike

http://putyourfaithinaction.org/stories/story/jesus_shows_up/

A great story of how “Jesus Shows Up” as people serve.

Red Fork Church of God in Tulsa, OK. The leadership at Red Fork strongly supported the idea of Faith in Action and cancelled their regular Sunday meeting to get the people out serving. Check out their Flickr site @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/14830457@N03/page2/ and their Picassa site @ http://picasaweb.google.com/dave.nitro/FIA2008?feat=directlink#