this is still is a challenge today. Jane began a church garden and we can use fresh produce in our meals and sometimes we are able to give out produce to our guests. We also began preparing readymade meals for the seniors at the CoOp’s Seasoned With Love project. Seasoned With Love takes food boxes to seniors who are immobile or having trouble getting out of their homes or they have no family to help them. Now, they get two prepared meals to heat up in the microwave every time we go out on a route. Presently, we make enough meals


to serve 100-120 people. There have been true “fishes and loaves” sto- ries, where we ran out of food and started defrosting items in the freezer to serve. On some occasions when we serve a recipe that we know is a group favorite, like Chicken Teriyaki, we prepare more and can reach up to 170 meals! We don’t serve just soups anymore. Our menu changed due to the partnering with the Atlanta Community Food Bank and having a greater selection of food products to make into meals. Another change is


that most of our guests take meals to go. Their families are waiting on them to get home from work or they have school functions to get to or their elderly parents don’t want to go out late in the afternoon/evening. In 2018, we served over 3,000 meals at Soup Nite including the Seasoned With Love program, aver- aging 35-40 households. We have guests that have become very close to us and we look forward to seeing them. We offer prayers, hugs, smiles and encourage- ment to each of our guests. There are scripture verses on each brown bag that leaves the church. Soup Nite has vendor and merchant support in the Grayson community. The Public Library comes over to reach out with library card sign ups and free books. Grayson Coffee gives out coffee at our Christmas celebra- tions and McDonalds donates their oatmeal containers to us for our soups. This ministry has reached into other ministries in our own church. On occasion, the youth group helps serve on Soup Nites and our shut ins are delivered meals as part of our Congregational Care group. One of the greatest pleasures in serving began in 2017 when a neighboring church, Faith Community Church, partnered in serving with us. Every Soup Nite they are there to prepare, serve and pray with our guests. Looking forward, we would like to serve more. In doing this, we are looking


into fundraising for a non profit Food Truck. Our truck would be to mainly de- liver meals that will be made in our church’s kitchen to the Seasoned With Love immobile seniors and to our Soup Nite families who have a need where they cannot get to our regular Monday meals. We also want to reach out to the chil- dren. It is our hope to use the truck’s counter window like an ice cream truck, to give out that much needed meal that is lost during the summer months when school is not in session. The truck will start conversations and build community. Highlands Soup Nite has a servant’s heart and we will continue to build rela- tionships as we serve with the Food Truck. There is always the hope that this example will be implemented in more churches so that there would be a fleet of trucks and greater community serving in the not so distance future. So, we are always praying….?


May/June 2019


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