From Blessed to Blessing
When we moved back to Ohio in 2012, we were broke, broke. We had a newborn baby who had just had open heart surgery, a 6 year old, a house that our tenants had trashed and not much $ in the bank. Oh, and neither of us were working yet. The amount of help we received from our families will always be immeasurable. Times were hard, but we were determined parents. We had no other choice but to ask for help. We soon thereafter applied and we were granted Food Stamps and Medicaid. I don’t know of many people that “like” to ask for help, but sometimes circumstances are out of our control.
Before Greg and I got married, I became Catholic and I received a small frame as a gift with this verse inside, “God’s mercies are new every morning.” Lam 3:23. This is a frame that I always packed in my suitcase when we were being re-stationed. It was very important to me and I read it a zillion times.
In 2015, our little family had been living back in Ohio for 2 years. It was a time where we were doing better financially, we had gotten back into the Church and I felt like I had no time to add 1 more thing to my plate. That is when my husband told me our church was looking for someone to head up the food program. Honestly, I had never felt a pull like that. I had a passion for feeding people and God was telling my heart I was the perfect fit. How could that be though? I was a person in need and I was being told to help others in need.
In May of 2015, First Dawn Food Pantry opened their doors. This organization that Greg and I built from the ground up was finally being opened. Well, it wasn’t wild enough to start a whole pantry from scratch, but I was then convicted that we needed to feed our community a Thanksgiving Meal AND give away free turkeys and baskets with all the fixin’s!
We eventually no longer needed to be Blessed with help from the state and we were on the front line of being a Blessing to our community. This Thanksgiving I give many thanks for all that we endured.
Whether you need to be Blessed, or if you are able to help in the way of Blessing others, we do all of this for Him. Afterall, “God’s mercies are new every morning.”
