• Contact
  • Return to IBSA
  • Advertise Through Us
  • Subscribe
  • E-Reader

IBSA News

Illinois Baptist State Newspaper

  • Quick Links
    • E-Reader
    • Subscribe
    • Advertise
    • Resource
  • News
    • IBSA
    • SBC
    • Culture
    • Illinois Churches
  • Stories
    • Thriving
    • Church Planting
    • Mission
    • Next Step
  • In Focus
  • Columns
    • Nate Adams
    • Eric Reed
    • Meredith Flynn
    • Table Talk
    • Reporter’s Notebook
    • Encouraging Words

Shoeboxes nearly hide a volunteer at Dorrisville Baptist Church’s annual fall outreach.

Churches ready families for fall with shoes, haircuts, and prayer

August 22, 2018 By Meredith Flynn

The “Backpack Blessing” at First Baptist Church, Bethalto, started as a way to bless students and families headed back to school. It turned into a prayer service dedicated to sending kids, teachers, and administrators into the new school year on a high note.

Before the Aug. 5 morning worship service, students brought in their backpacks, which were filled with school supplies and parenting resources provided by the church. Most important, though, was the prayer time, said FBC Bethalto associate pastor Tim Drury. During the service, families gathered in small groups across the worship as church members prayed over them.

“I believe the real blessing was the directed prayer time for all the individuals in our church,” Drury said, “and watching the generations pray for each other.”

Across Illinois, churches used August to reach into their communities with ministries tailored to families with school-aged children. In Chicago, Another Chance Church held their annual back-to-school party Aug. 10, with free services for kids and families, food, and a bounce house provided by the Chicago Metro Baptist Association.

The party was the culmination of the church’s six-week summer camp for kids. “We try to do the best we can to share Christ while keeping them safe for five hours a day,” said Pastor Kenyatta Smith. For Another Chance, which recently relocated to a new campus in a different Chicago community, the party and the camp are ways to show their commitment to the neighborhood. The church is working to “keep on letting people know we’re here,” Smith said.

Near the church is a housing community with 2,000 children. At the back-to-school party, Another Chance gave away almost 500 backpacks, and more than 100 kids received free eye exams and haircuts.

At the other end of the state, Dorrisville Baptist Church in Harrisburg welcomed families to a back-to-school celebration they’ve hosted for 16 years. People start lining up for the Sunday afternoon event while church is still going on, said coordinator Judy Taylor. Once inside the building, they meet with counselors who offer to pray for specific requests as their families start the new school year. Then, they’re able to choose from services including haircuts, school supplies, and a massive shoe store set up in the church’s dining room.

The church realized the need for shoes several years ago when teachers told them kids were sitting on the sidelines in gym class because they didn’t have appropriate shoes to play on the gym floor. “We need to fix this,” was Dorrisville’s response, Taylor said.

The church works with a local Payless Shoe Store to purchase the shoes—more than $11,000 worth this year. At the Aug. 12 party, they gave away 513 pairs of gym shoes and a pair of socks with each one.

“We just stand in awe,” Taylor said, of how God orchestrates the back-to-school ministry. In the room where volunteers served a meal of baked spaghetti, bread, salad, and ice cream sundaes, hostess Amy Craig met a young boy who was excited to visit the church’s Mercy Center to pick out gently used clothing. When he said he would choose clothes over the meal, Craig said, “I told him he could have both. He couldn’t eat fast enough to get over to the Mercy Center for clothing!”

Taylor said the annual outreach really changes the volunteers as much or more than the people receiving clothes or haircuts or shoes.

“We think we’re serving people, and we are, but we’re more like Jesus at the end of this year than we are at the beginning.”

Share This Story

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Featured Columns

Meredith Flynn

Spectators or participants?

Meredith Flynn

My church is in a season of refocusing on prayer. Every Sunday before the sermon, we break into small groups and pray together. One of the goals of this emphasis, our pastor has said, is to move from being spectators of prayer to participants in it. Last season, the football team I have followed and […]

Nate Adams

Good new days

Nate Adams

We all have “good old days” in our lives. They may be the days when we felt most successful or appreciated, or when things were done the way we agreed with or liked, or when those we respected were in charge. Most of us have good old days in our churches too. Days when our […]

How we can speak to men in the abortion conversation

Justin Mullins

As a pastor, father and follower of Christ, I have often found myself with a heavy heart when I think and pray about abortion. I’m saddened. I’m sickened. I’m burdened for the life of preborn children who are precious in the sight of God. And I have a deep conviction that there’s more that I […]

More Columns

Study shows Hispanic churches are young, vibrant, and growing

Lifeway Research

A new survey of Hispanic churches shows their attenders are younger and more evangelistic than at other Protestant churches—and there are more of them in worship on any given Sunday. Together with two dozen other religious organizations, Lifeway Research polled 692 pastors of churches that are at least 50% Hispanic for the largest survey of […]

News

Hunt sues SBC, EC and Guidepost

Brandon Porter, Baptist Press

Longtime pastor and former SBC President Johnny Hunt has filed suit against the SBC, the SBC Executive Committee (EC) and Guidepost Solutions. The suit seeks unspecified damages related to allegations of defamation and the invasion of privacy based on accusations made against Hunt in the 2022 Guidepost report stemming from an investigation into the alleged […]

SBC aids largest people displacement in history

Stetzer leaves Wheaton to lead Biola’s theology school

More News Stories

Mission

Sallateeska baptism demonstrates SBC connections

Baptist Press

(Ed. Note—In our July issue, we reported that Illinois’s very own Sandy Wisdom-Martin told the story of her brother’s recent baptism during her WMU presentation at the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Anaheim. We thought we you would appreciate this longer account that shows God’s fingerprints through multiple SBC connections. It’s too good to miss.) […]

A first-time ministry to migrant workers is very fruitful

FIRST-PERSON: A once-feared tribe now spreads the Gospel

More Mission Stories

  • News
  • Mission
  • In Focus
  • Columns

Copyright © 2023 · Website by Megaphone Designs