Posts Tagged ‘Head Start’
Christmas Compassion at Northview
Posted on: January 4, 2014
BY HEATHER GOBLE-SORRELLS
Christmas shopping, lights, presents and visits to Santa Claus are all underway the last few weeks before Christmas. In all the hustle, bustle and gift-giving madness that consumes us every December, do we ever really stop to think of those who are less fortunate? Or those who are not part of our own family and circle of friends?
Northview’s Christmas Compassion does just that and has caused a shift in the church’s mindset.
Northview’s Christmas Compassion tree (photo by Denise McCool)
This year marked the third annual Christmas Compassion which was born of other Christmas charity drives in prior years–Share the Blessing and Christmas Outside the Box. Through Christmas Compassion, Northview asks church attendees to take a tag from a Christmas tree and buy something listed on the tag. The tags are classified by age group and gender. They list a need, want and family item. Through this drive, Northview was “able to see the thankfulness from each family,” said Shanna Thompson, Northview’s Good Neighbor Coordinator.
These are some of the items families brought back to church to donate: socks, underwear, hats, gloves, clothes, toys, books, board games, diapers, wipes…and a whole host of other items!
The gifts are all going to local families in Hamilton and Marion Counties. Specifically, the gifts go to Life Centers which serve women in crisis pregnancy, Head Start of Hamilton County which provides preschool to underprivileged families, Indianapolis Public School 54, Good Samaritan Network, Brookside Community Church and a few Latino churches in downtown Indianapolis.
“Each of the families receiving the gifts are extremely thankful for each item,” said Thompson.
BY DIANA GORIN
When Christmas rolls around, it can be all about saving money. Getting the most out of the dollar to buy a gift for the people you care about is one of the realities of the holiday season. It’s easy to get wrapped up in Christmas sales and worry about your own family, but there are families here in Carmel who can’t afford Christmas presents for their own family.
This season Northview partnered with Hamilton County’s Head Start program for the second year of Northview’s Christmas Shop in order to provide a miracle for underprivileged families during the holiday season. At this event on December 13, Northview was able to help 92 families choose and wrap gifts and have a holiday party to celebrate the season.
Gifts are lovingly wrapped at Northview’s Christmas Shop (photo by Dennis McClintock)
Over the past few weeks, Northview has been collecting presents instructed on the gift tags on the Christmas trees outside the atrium. Northview families have been buying those gifts to help contribute to this Christmas store.
Pearl McAndrews, a Northview student, volunteered in setting up this event. “It was a really cool experience to see how all of the individual members of the congregation came together to help make someone else’s Christmas better. Buying the individual gifts you don’t realize the magnitude of the effort, but seeing everything that was bought put it all in perspective,” McAndrews said.
Every Christmas, we go out to buy gifts for our family. We buy it from a store that is looking to make as much profit as possible during the holiday season. For these Hamilton Head Start families they were able to get gifts for someone they love, from someone who loves them. These presents are more than just a gift, they were an act of love shown by Northview families to help a neighbor.
Partnership with Head Start began nearly 10 years ago as a part of Northview Children’s Ministry. Called “Candy Cane Lane” it was a program that enabled Northview attendees to adopt families from Head Start during Christmas. For the past two years the Christmas store gave Northview families an opportunity to interact and work with them. This new model also gave the parents the opportunity to choose the gifts their child received.
At this event there were many activities for the families. They were able to take family photos, make a craft, enjoy story-telling and have cookies and juice. Then, for half an hour, parents dropped their kids off at childcare and went to the Christmas Store to buy gifts for them. Families were also invited to join Northview for Christmas services.
“The simple acts we do on our own, either buying the gifts or helping assemble the shop, come together in a really neat way in order to help others,” McAndrews said. This is what being a good neighbor is all about.
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