Crystal Church Hands Out Free Meals And Groceries
Serenity Village Community Church in Crystal might not be holding regular services due to the coronavirus outbreak, but they are putting their faith in action in a very visible way.
The church decided to change up their weekly food shelf called “Serenity Shelf.” Instead of inviting people to eat a meal inside the dining hall and leave with a bag of groceries, volunteers handed out groceries to around 125 vehicles on Friday.
Serenity Church handed out bags of food to more than 500 cars on Saturday.
“We’ve gathered up as many groceries as we could over the last few days from restaurants that have been closing. People who had produced that they weren’t able to use them anymore,” said Kiley Benson, Director of Missions and Outreach at Serenity Village.
On Saturday, a team of about 30 volunteers formed an assembly line to put the bags together. They loaded up on bread, dairy products, fresh fruits, and vegetables. The group also dished out hot meals to a long line of vehicles that wound through the parking lot.
“Just putting groceries, produce, love, and hot meals into people’s cars,” explained Benson. “Just to love on people and remind people that not only is the church here for them, but everybody is going to get together and make a difference.”
“It needs to be eaten. We’ve been food rescuing from all over the city. We just need to get it to a place where it can be eaten,” said Crystal Mayor Jim Adams. “Please find a neighbor or a friend who can come.”
The church says they served over 500 vehicles on Saturday.
Serenity Church Plans to Continue Serving
Serenity Church staff say they will continue to serve the community for as long as they have resources.
“There’s a lot of people that are coming through saying, Oh, these are for my neighbors, they’re not able to come out. They’re older. So these are people who aren’t necessarily able to go to the grocery store, or their resources may already be stretched because they haven’t been working for the last week,” said Brendan Banks, a Crystal city council member.
If you need food or need food delivered, reach out to Kiley Benson at Kiley.Benson@bekind2people.org.
