Backpack Outreach

I never really thought of myself as a good writer and surely not a good enough writer to have an article published in a newspaper.... but here it is. Soon, it will be published in the Neighbor to Neighbor newspaper of Clay County. I am honored to be able to share all of the efforts of Canvas Church with our surrounding community. I give all the glory to God!

In preparation for the upcoming school year, members of Canvas Church in Orange Park, FL embarqued on a backpack outreach to help kids in need within the Clay County area. To fulfill this need, Canvas Church along with 99.9 Gator Country hosted a school supplies drive for the community in hopes of gaining enough materials to fill 250 backpacks. Not only did they reach this goal, but they were able to attain enough materials to fully stock 300 backpacks. This event included fun for the entire family including great music broadcasted live by 99.9 Gator Country, face painting, bounce houses and some amazing giveaways for everyone that came out.

The opportunity to sponsor an entire school presented itself. Through this sponsorship, Canvas Church was able to reach a broad spectrum of families within the community. On August 20, members of Canvas Church set up shop in the cafeteria of Grove Park Elementary School for a backpack giveaway. They served this school with several different fun stations for the kids including headband making, face painting, individualized backpack labeling, balloon making courtesy of O2B Kids and much more. The night was a huge success. A need presented itself and Canvas Church along with others within the community stepped up to bless the kids of Grove Park Elementary School. For more information, check out Canvas Church's website at http://www.canvaschurch.net/.

90% is better than 100%

I have really been struggling recently with money, but who isn't?! I have been very selfish at times and have wanted to spend it how I think we should spend it. In fact, while putting together our budget, I left tithing for last. If we had any money left over, we would give it to the church. This would be after all our bills were paid and some spent on personal items. Some Sundays we didn't give anything because of poor planning. I'm definitely not proud of this, but it's a very real issue in our lives.

Over the past few weeks, the sermon series at our church (canvaschurch.net) entitled "Mine, All Mine" has really convicted me. The sermon on "My Money" really hit home. Instead of putting God first and giving to Him first, we were actually giving to him LAST! How selfish is that?! So, with our last paycheck, we put our trust in God and gave our 10% as our first expenditure instead of our last.

Luke 6:30 says, "Give and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

I am already starting to see this good measure in our lives. On a good week at work, I have been getting about 18-20 patients (I get paid by the patient). By the end of the week it's looking like I will have seen 30 patients this week. Praise God! I want to encourage each of you to put your trust in the Lord and He will prevail!