2010 Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service

A New Year Brings Renewed Hearts For Communities Everywhere

U.S. Chapters and Church Family,

2010 not only marks a New Year, but a renewed mind and heart for what some people consider the most important part of life – SERVICE. The volunteer results of this year’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service surprised not only all of us here at HOPE worldwide, but organizations, volunteers, churches, citizens, and communities across the United States.

13,000 volunteers served this year, 3,000 more volunteers than the previous year.
Chapters and churches hosted 105 service sites across the United States
Disciples and community members served more than 53,000 volunteer hours
Volunteers across the U.S. served 149,077 people through this one national service holiday, a record here at HOPE worldwide.

We would like to thank all of the disciples who participated and went out putting their faith into action. God is blessing your efforts. We also want to thank the supportive church leaders around the country.

Disciples served their communities through a variety of projects including:

box packing at local food banks
hot meals served to homeless families
community clean-ups
mural paintings
school and community center renovations
programs for children in foster care
home rehabbing for elderly men and women
Fire Preparedness Reach Out program in partnership with the American Red Cross. More than 40 Chapters canvassed in low income, fire vulnerable neighborhoods with the Red Cross, having conversations about fire safety and emergency planning, and installing smoke detectors

Many of HOPE worldwide Chapters were in disbelief at the number of volunteers who came out to serve with the fire preparedness program. Worcester Chapter Representative Michelle Charon said that “some came as far as Rhode Island and Connecticut to help us out in Worcester, Massachusetts. One woman who was there with her mother came when she heard about the fire safety focus. They are still displaced after they had a kitchen fire.”

Over the weekend we received floods of emails from Chapters and churches sharing about their service experience, including the encouragement many of you felt in sharing your faith with the non-disciples who were serving at your sites. Houston Chapter Director Todd Edwards shared “at all three of our locations, the most consistent experience was the inquiries of other volunteers about the Houston Church and the hearts of the disciples that were serving!!” Thanks to all of our volunteers who showed the example of Christ as they served and reached out to volunteers outside of the church!

HOPE worldwide service projects began January 13 and will be continuing through January 25.

Click here to read more details
on each chapter’s service projects

Love in Christ,

Antonio Boyd
Vice President, North America

Jenni Clemens
National Director of Chapter Relations

Visit us at www.HOPEww.org to learn more about all of HOPE worldwide’s programs and see how you can be a part of global change to bring hope to some of the world’s most needy.