The Boy with Five and Two

By Terri Conlin

Danny and Helpers

When Danny Herbst was challenged to make his mark on his city by serving the needy, he thought he’d have to head to downtown Portland. He quickly realized he might look no further than his suburban neighborhood of Tualatin. On a forgotten corner behind a condemned school building, he discovered the Tualatin School House Food Pantry.

Danny first volunteered as part of a college assignment at Portland State. As a personal shopper, he assisted families with the selection of an emergency food box balanced in nutrition. He was surprised to find hungry people in his community. Next, Danny served as a member of Therefore Go!, the 20-something ministry at Rolling Hills Community Church. This time the shelves were nearly bare. Danny gathered a small group of friends from church and collected food in the blocks around his home. They left empty brown paper bags on doorsteps and returned one week later to collect full bags. People were happy to give. One woman came running, still dressed in scrubs from work, to make sure her donation was not missed. By the time Danny reached her corner, she had filled to overflowing two grocery bags from her own pantry.

Danny and his friends delivered over 900 pounds of food to the Tualatin School House Food Pantry and inspired his church to donate another 1200 pounds. When the need for food was shared at a Rolling Hills Sunday service, Bruce Patton of We Care Oregon came forward with a half-filled semi-truck from Frontier Missions, a coast-to-coast ministry to Native Americans on reservations. Volunteers unloaded 13,000 pounds of food from the truck just in time to help families start the new school year. Like the boy with five barley loaves and two small fish, Danny’s giving has multiplied many times over.

Tualatin School House Food Pantry is a member of the Oregon Food Bank. Their mission is to eliminate hunger in the Tualatin-Durham area by providing emergency food to struggling households once a month. Some pantry food is from the US Department of Agriculture, but most is gleaned from the food industry. Generous donations come from grocery chains, local bakeries and farmers’ markets.

Every Sunday volunteers purchase 100 gallons of milk. An egg lady collects fresh eggs from local farms everyday. She washes and organizes the eggs into cartons at her home then stacks them in neat rows in the pantry refrigerators. An elderly cheese lady faithfully shops for Tillamook cheese each month. A birthday lady fills festive bags with cake-mix, frosting and candles so a child can celebrate a birthday. A sale-savvy cereal couple supply more than 180 pounds of cereal every two weeks. Single acts of kindness leave a big mark.

The Tualatin School House Food Pantry is now open Monday evenings with laden shelves because a shy young man said to his friends, “Let’s go!” Generous hearts followed. Could you bring blessings from your corner of our city, perhaps as milkman, flour girl, pasta person or little bean boy?©

Contact Terri at whitepitchers.com

THEREFORE GO!

“Beyond the Cardboard”

By Terri Conlin

Something’s afoot in Portland; twenty-somethings to be exact.  Despite what some say, these 18-30 year-olds are not lost but in a time of transition through college into career, through singleness into marriage, through dependence into interdependence.  You can find them every Sunday night in the East Atrium at Rolling Hills Community Church studying the Bible together. They are The Gathering. 

But gathering in the name of Christ is only half of their mission, one of two interlocking rings. The other ring is a scattering in His name. Not a random flinging without purpose or plan, but a scattering of light, a sowing from His Hand.  Throughout the month, you may find The Scattering serving meals to the homeless, distributing water on a hot summer day or connecting with people on the streets of our city. These intertwined rings of gathering and scattering are called THEREFORE GO!

THEREFORE GO! is led by one of their own, Chris Nye. Last summer Chris led what came to be known affectionately as “Nye-ble Study.” This year Chris is looking far beyond the classroom lessons of Bible College and into the real lives of people on the street. Chris narrowed his gaze to Portland’s homeless youth, ages 18-25. The challenge is to see beyond outward appearances straight to the heart of the person behind a cardboard sign or asleep in a cardboard box.  THEREFORE GO! is following God’s command to Abraham to be a blessing wherever God might send him,

“Get out of your country,
From your family
And from your father’s house,
To a land I will show you . . .
And you shall be a blessing.”

Last summer THEREFORE GO! served together in downtown Portland for the first time. They cooked a spaghetti dinner for homeless youth and followed the pattern of Christ: engagement. Rather than just hand down the meal from behind a kitchen counter, they sat across the table and ate with those they served. They chatted with the youth, played pool and were soundly whipped in foosball. 

In Matthew 28, a risen Jesus appeared to His disciples saying, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.” Remember your English teacher’s saying, ‘When you see therefore, ask what is it there for?’  We go out into our world because of Christ, because of the cross, because of His love for the Father and ours for His Son, because of love for our fellow man. After His resurrection Jesus showed His hands and feet to those who knew Him, His pierced hands and feet. These were His scars of love and obedience; wounds for the blessing of the whole world, God’s smile. The Scattering is weaving that beautiful blessing into their home city. With the autumn leaves, some will scatter to cities as far as Denver, Seattle, Waco and beyond. Look for stories from wherever The Scattering might go, stories beyond the cardboard.

Contact Terri at whitepitchers.com