I remember sitting around a table and talking about how many sponsored Night Strikes we would like to set as our goal this year. I am not sure if I was skeptical or naive but I thought that 12 sponsored nights was going to be a hard thing to accomplish in the first year that we were offering this. To my surprise the response was overwhelming. Call after call came in over the next couple of months (some even wanting to sponsor that very same evening).  What an amazing thing to be a part of an organization that desires others to participate in making real and lasting change.

As much as I like to see that people are getting behind things that make a difference; I really like watching the difference being made in them.

Recently, one of our Night Strikes was sponsored by a few people. They were a small group that came together to do something awesome. They were full of questions when they arrived, unsure about how it all worked. They were there a bit early, so our staff had the opportunity to meet them and put them to work with our preparations for the evening. I caught up to the two gentlemen under the bridge that night. They were standing in the middle of our space, looking around at what was happening, with an expression on their faces that I wish I had a camera for. They had no idea what they were sponsoring that night. All around them people were being impacted by love in a HUGE way, and they were a part of making that happen. They walked away messed up by love that night.

Priceless.

Today I organized the 13^th sponsor for the year. That is one more group that we have an opportunity to impact with love. If you are keeping count we are only half way through the year and we have surpassed our “goal”. Every month people are responding to Love in real ways and we are truly blessed to be invited to the show. Thank you for your continued support and God bless you.

Zach Clark

Every year, Easter is one of our favorite times to spend with our Btown Families, and this year was no exception.

It was a great Easter for all, and now we eagerly await our chance to see our families again!

Our followers are going beyond this blog and into the Twittersphere, connecting us to new people with their own passion for those who are hungry and homeless.  Through our Twitter connections tonight we met Tym Less, of Form Photography, endeavoring on his own media campaign to keep a permanent focus on hunger and homelessness.  We’ll show you some of the pictures he took soon.

Want to follow us on Twitter too?  You can do so by click HERE or on the Twitter icon in the side bar.  Use the #nightstrike hashtag when you tweet about it and spread the twitter love about @BridgeTownInc so we can take our message even further!

Just a glimpse of some of the Tweets from the Night!

@marshallsnider : Excited about 1st #nightstrike of 2012. Chipotle with da boys first then down town PDX!! @BridgeTownInc

@BridgeTownInc : A gr8 #nightstrike 2night! Good number of volunteers! Cocoa Tinged Beef Stew was served…mmm good hearty soup for a cold night. Stay warm!

@marshallsnider : @FormPhotography nice 2 meet u 2nite #nightstrike. Hope all went well 4 u 2night…love to see the picts. Thanks for respecting the guests.

@marshallsnider : @ugmpdx thanks for the socks and caps tonight at #nightstrike!! It’s great to partner to “Love People Because People Matter!”

Thanks to all the wonderful volunteers who helped make this year’s Christmas party a great success for our BTown Kids and families!

Metro Toy Drive and KGW Toy Drive helped with a number of gifts, as well as many individuals!

Special thanks to the following faith communities for providing gifts and or volunteers!

Community of Christ Church, Hillsboro
Mountainview Community Church, Oregon City
Christ Community Church, Beaverton
Life Roads, Tualatin
Door of Hope, Portland
Mt Olivet Baptist Church, Portland
Faith Bible High School, Aloha
Westside Christian High School, Lake Oswego
Stanfield Assemblies of God, Stanfield

Norma Benjamin provided 100 tins of home made cookies to top off the stockings and gifts the kids received, and Bob (aka Santa) did a fantastic job of loving on the little ones.

We could not effectively love our BTown Kids without your help, so from our home, to yours, we say THANK YOU for helping us make this a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Thanks to all of you who so generously donated to our Thanksgiving Baskets we were able to bless over 75 families with a full Thanksgiving meal for them to prepare for their families.  It was a chilly, but dry Saturday and we had a great group of volunteers from Faith Bible Christian School, The Pearl Church and Door of Hope to help us with the distribution.  From helping the families get everything they needed for their baskets to walking them back to their homes – interacting, loving – the volunteers exemplified what BridgeTown stands for – “Loving People, Because People Matter.”  In addition to our volunteers we had a number of other organizations help us make this all happen and for that, we are grateful.

Baskets were filled with turkeys, rolls, potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing, butter, cranberry sauce, gravy and much more – all rounded off with a huge pumpkin pie and whipped cream.  Each of these families will be blessed and know on Thanksgiving how valued they are, because you gave.  You cared.

Thank-you!

]]> http://bridgetowninc.org/btown-kids/successful-blessed-thanksgiving-basket-distribution/feed/ 0 http://bridgetowninc.org/event-need/help-us-provide-thanksgiving-baskets/ http://bridgetowninc.org/event-need/help-us-provide-thanksgiving-baskets/#comments Sat, 29 Oct 2011 21:51:17 +0000 Ana http://bridgetowninc.org/?p=704 Thanksgiving is just around the corner, can you believe it?!  For most of us, that lends to ideas of family getting together – gathering the whole gang around the table, sharing a veritable feast of turkey or ham and warm pumpkin pie. The buzz of love shared can almost be tangible. For many families, this is THE event of the year, the hard and fast “family time”. We look forward to plan for, and think about Thanksgiving most of the month of November!

For many others, though, it is a time when loneliness, poverty and despair are accentuated, when gathering the family to the table simply means to call the kids in for mac and cheese… again. For these small fractured families, there are no extended members – aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas simply don’t exist as part of the heart of their home. Often the stories of families in poverty are marked with pain, misunderstanding, abandonment and even abuse.

For the last 4 years, you have helped BridgeTown provide a Thanksgiving meal to 80+ marginal families each year, right here in Portland. Most of the families served have children involved in our summer BTown Kids programs at the New Columbia, and in the Parkside Commons cluster of apartments. A few of the families are elderly or have been affected by the economic down turn, and have nothing to bring to the table this year. For all of them, the word spoken over them is that they are LOVED, that someone CARES, and that their family is IMPORTANT and MATTERS. When we relieve the burden of trying to provide the fixings for a feast, we provide margins that foster generosity in their own homes, sometimes it is even the catalyst to restoring broken relationships!

We are excited to have the opportunity to provide these Extravagant Thanksgiving Baskets again this year, and hope you will jump on board with us! We cannot do it without valuable partnerships with churches and individuals who share the same heart as I have written of, above.

Please pray, and respond by filling out this online sign up form.

For a list of items to fill each basket, click here.

To link directly to our giving page, click here.

Completed baskets can be delivered the day of distribution, while partial baskets, and monetary donations should be received no later than WEDNESDAY, November 16th. Please contact me at 503 347-1082 to arrange donation drop offs.

A week ago the FIRE discipleship class had the privilege to serve the Lord in a mighty way with BridgeTown in Portland, Oregon.  Some of the areas we were all able to work in were walkabouts, foot washing, table conversationalists, and listening with those who need an ear to hear.

One experience I had while serving at BridgeTown was when I was on the walkabout. As my group was walking around the streets of downtown Portland we stopped to talk to a man who was eating at a shelter.  After a couple minutes of speaking with him, he excused himself to go and give the rest of his food to another homeless person whom he did not know.  When I saw him give the homeless person all he had left, it made me think about Christians, wondering whether or not we are as selfless with all we have.  As a Christian when you see a fellow believer in need do you help or just walk on by.  Looking at the homeless people on the streets sharing with one another it has helped me to realize that we need to help those in need and share the love of Christ.  We need to be thankful for what we have and bless those who have nothing.  One other thing I learned was to not look at people as just homeless but as Children of Christ whom God loves just as much as anyone else.

Acts 20:35 says, “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”

The second great experience I had was when we went under the Burnside Bridge and was able to speak with some of the people there.  One man I remember quite vividly was a man named Richard.  Sarah and I decided to go speak with him so we could get to know him.  As we sat there making small talk Richard said, “If you guys can, will you pray with me?”  Right away I knew this was a divine encounter from God.  As we prayed for Richard and his alcohol issue, we could feel the Holy Spirit’s presence, and we know that Richard could too.

After the many great experience we all received, I cannot wait to go and help at BridgeTown again. It is always a great experience to humble oneself before men and learn to see people with the eyes of God and not the eyes of men.

~ Brittany

Many of you are aware of our BTown Kids environment which operates in 2 neighborhoods in North Portland: New Columbia, and the Parkside Commons cluster apartments. Both sites are, arguably, the most oppressed and violent neighborhoods in the city. Both of our sites have many at risk children who are vulnerable to great injustices and hardships. But we are so privileged to be able to spend the summer, and beyond with our amazing BTown Kids! God’s light shines brightest in the dark!

We are very fortunate to have been given a permit from the City of Portland to operate our BTown Kids program in McCoy Park again, as well as in the Parkside Commoms, Pier Park and Ridgecrest Timbers Apartment complexes we call “The Cluster”.

Each Saturday from June through August we’ll drive our BTown Kids trailer and truck into these neighborhoods for four hours of fun, food and, most importantly, to build relationships with these precious kids and their parents. Using a Biblically based virtue teaching, our hope is to encourage and minister to the whole family with the hope of introducing them to the life changing message of Christ. It is an incredible and effective environment with as many as 200 children in attendance on any given Saturday.

On the 11th of June we will be doing our soft start at both sites. At this time we will be introducing our new staff and “Outrageous Living” curriculum to the parents and children.

Why this letter?

I am needing your partnership with us. In years past, a few, very generous, donors have stepped up to entirely fund the BTown Kids sites, and we have never needed to look beyond these resources, but this year they were unable to fund these critical programs.

Each BTown Kids site costs about $5000.00 for the 13 week summer. This breaks down to $385.00 per week for each site or $770.00 per week for both sites. Each site is feeding almost 100 children, while providing them a strong, virtue based teaching and a great team of leaders who provide a constant relationship with the children and parents.

Will you consider sponsoring a week, or part of a week, or more of BTown Kids?

We know great things are going to happen this summer and we are confident the resources to bring this critical program to Portland’s inner city kids can be found within the Body of Christ. This is why we feel compelled to ask you for your partnership.

If you do want to partner with us it is easy to do. You can give online here: PARTNER WITH BTOWN KIDS. It’s a secure and easy way to make your gift count right away. Alternately you can mail a gift to:

BridgeTown Inc. 21065 SW Stafford Rd. Tualatin Or. 97062. Please write on the check memo line BTOWN KIDS.

I want you to know how much I appreciate your past partnership with BridgeTown Inc. We thank you for your kindness as we seek to “Love people because people matter.”

If you have any questions please email me or call me.

Seeking the prosperity of the city,

Marshall