Christmas in the City 2023
Christmas in the City is one of our primary outreach and distribution events. This year, we’ve distributed $5.5 million worth of resources to various churches across the city for Christmas. Most of the resources we’ve given for Christmas have been sorted into bags of toys, household goods, electronics, and clothing, sometimes even paired down further into pillows, socks, or other items. Each partner decides how they want to use the resources. Some set up shops in their gymnasiums, and some partner with a local school to set up shops for the teachers and kids in that school. Each church uses the resources to bless those who need a little help at Christmastime and even those who need to remember the blessing of Christmas and Jesus coming as a gift to the world.
The photos in the attached slider are from Hope Church Gardendale and Sixteenth Ave Baptist, which held its shop at Tuggle Elementary School. Hope Church served 146 families with water, popcorn, and prayer, in addition to the resources. They had a prayer tent, and it became a sacred place of tears and laughter. Much ministry happened that day. Some shared that they would only have been able to have Christmas presents with these Christmas shops.
In addition to distributing resources, we hosted several groups associated with different ministries in the city for a time to shop for Christmas in our warehouse. Among our guests were ladies from The WellHouse, Bethany Home, some local elementary schools, some homeowners we have served, teenage foster kids, and many others serving the city in sacrificial ways. Rhonda Marshall, our Director of Community Engagement, worked exceptionally hard to prepare and set aside some awesome gifts from the donated goods from corporate partners we previously sorted. We love seeing how she uses her gifts and talents to serve others.
As part of our Christmas shop, we offered our guests the chance to pick from many of the goods we had from categories like clothing, electronics, games, personal hygiene items, Christmas decorations, and children’s toys. It was our pleasure to wrap gifts for those who wanted wrapped packages. The generosity of so many of the foster children especially touched us. One teenage young lady planned to gift all the items she’d selected from our Christmas shop, including the wireless earbuds we gave her. We were moved to tears by her generosity. What a beautiful picture of being blessed to be a blessing! This young lady exemplifies faith and generosity to us all. May we all be like her this holiday season!
