Planting Seeds of Hope - Day 5

A Hunger Awareness VBS

The Disappearing Lunch 

Love Bags assembled at VBS

In Whitehall, Texas, a few miles from Tyler, a teacher's lunch disappeared from her desk. After doing some searching, she discovered a third-grade boy eating her lunch.  As she approached him, he stuffed the entire lunch in his mouth. the child was hungry and had not had anything to ea in a few days.

Amy Culpepper, a teacher at the school, raised awareness of the hunger problem at the school and also at her church, First Baptist of Whitehouse. she found that there were two hundred students who had free or reduced lunches at the school during the week.  However, these students had little or no food on the weekends. These children came to school hungry on Monday mornings.. Amy Culpepper discovered that many of the children were hungry because their parents could not afford to buy food.

The pastor of First Baptist Church, Ray Davis, knew the church needed to help these families. The church started a backpack program. Every Thursday, volunteers in the church pack food in the backpacks for the schoolchildren who need them. The children take the backpacks home on Fridays so they will have plenty to eat over the weekend and then bring the empty backpacks back on Monday. The children who receive the backpacks are so happy to get them that they give the volunteers big hugs.

The church receives money from people in the church and the Texas Baptist Offering for World Hunger to help buy the food and backpacks for the program. the church is looking for ways to feed children in other schools in Whitehouse and to expand the program into the summer months.