171 households picked up envelopes during the services on Sunday, May 3rd, 2009! They had no idea what was inside...it was awesome!This is the post to let others know what you did as a result of the Jubilee. Every time you do something with all or a portion of the Jubilee money, comment to this post and the staff at Hillcrest will create a new post with that comment so others can journey with the Jubilee. Comments do not show up right away, they go through an administrator first.
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This year was my first year up at SDSU. Right away in the school year I was reminded of how faithful God is. He has blessed me with so many encouraging people who are also trying to pursue the way of Jesus. One person who has really been a blessing to me this year is my Bri. She has taught me a lot about loving people and choosing joy daily. This semester she has had to deal with a lot of heartache in her family. Through it all she still held on to the faithfulness of God. We are both leaving to go on missions trips 2 weeks from today. I have really seen the faithfulness of God leading up to my trip to Honduras, especially through financial support. Bri is going to Ghana, Africa and up until today was under halfway funded. When given the $500 today I was pretty blown away. After thinking for a while Hannah and I decided to pool the money together and give back to her. She has been a huge blessing in my life and this was the perfect opportunity for her to be blessed...and a huge reminder of how faithful God is to her in the midst of a lot of the troubles she has been dealing with lately.
ReplyDeleteWhen we opened the envelope and heard the challenge we knew exactly what we were going to do with the money. We had no other thoughts. We have a friend who just graduated from college and trying to get back on his feet. Next my dad is a Vietnam Vet and and is having some health issues and unable to work at this time. Working our way down the list we have another friend who is having some car problems and relies on it to take her son out of town for his soccer games. We also gave out some gift cards to those who need it. It is very rewarding to be able to have this opportunity to help so many people. They are very thankful and so are we. Thanks for giving us this challenge!
ReplyDeleteChad & Cassie Ueke
First off I'd like to thank Hillcrest for their dedication and compassion for the people of this city. I was one of the blessed people to receive an envelope today. As soon as the service was over we contacted a friend that works with the Answer Center and automatically found a Bosnian family in need of food. A man, his wife, a 4 week old baby, and a 3 year old daughter, were with a fridge and no food. So my fiancé, her daughter and I went and spent $240 on food, hygiene products, diapers, and other necessities, and delivered them ourselves to this family's apartment. It was saddening to see that they needed so much more; the 3 year old wore shoes that were too big and kept falling off as we took the groceries inside. The man is very saddened that he has no job to support his family, and no car, just a bicycle to get him around. The looks of gratitude and the many thank yous were enough to brighten our day, all I could say was "God has blessed us with this money; therefore, we felt we wanted to pass these blessings on to you".
ReplyDeleteWe also knew of a woman living in a sober living house, who was in desperate need of undergarments. So we took it upon ourselves to lessen her burden as well.
As for the rest of the money, we felt a bit selfish, but we also felt God answered our prayers as well. My fiancé and I, will be getting married in almost a month. We are very much a low income family, being that my fiancé earns no income and my income all goes to a never budging debt. Our wedding was planned hastily, and everything is planned and set, we just have no money to pay for stuff yet. We took the rest of the money, and bought little things such as: a unity candle, cake topper, ring bearer pillow, flower girl basket & flowers, guest list book w/ pen, cake cutter, and small centerpieces for the tables. Just little things we have been stressing out about.
The money handed out was a blessing for all involved. We just want to thank Hillcrest for the generosity and praise your efforts on making this Year of Jubilee one to remember. God is great, thank you Hillcrest.
-William Jensen & Jessica Hilpert
Remember "Oprah's Big Give"? Wouldn't it be great if we could increase what we give by getting even MORE people involved? "God's Big Give" has a better ring to it.
ReplyDeleteDo we have any dentists in our congregation? We know of a person in need of alot of dental work who is in pain. He works construction but with building down he is not working as much. His wife is pregnant with their third child and his father is in hospice. He has needed dental work and new teeth for a long time but has never had the money to do it. He is the first to help someone in need and now he needs someone to help him. It would be great to go in with others to help this family or find a dentist willing to donate his labor.
I am very thankful to have been in church this past Sunday. I am not a member of Hillcrest, nor do I attend church as often as I should. My family has been struggling with finances for a couple years now. It just seems like one thing after another comes up whenever we get a little savings going. We had previously been blessed to have some outstanding medical debt written off and that sure helped take a load of worry off of my shoulders! Combined with the $500 envelope from Sunday, We are almost caught up on our monthly bills! I feel guilty for keeping this money though, as I feel guilty for even receiving it in the first place considering that I do not go to church regularly, and my husband has'nt went in years. After showing him that envelope on Sunday titled "Year of Jubilee" and explaining to him what happened that day in church, I watched his eyes start to tear up, as he could'nt believe that anyone would do that for us! I hope that this will prompt him (and me) to start going to church at Hillcrest regularly. I also hope to be able to turn around and help someone else in financial trouble, just as we were helped, someday!
ReplyDeleteI am a bit embarrassed to sign my name, but I will not be too proud. My family deeply appreciates your gift of random kindness shown to us!
-Leah Harkema
We held on to the $$ until we could discuss it as a couple how we would use the $. I instantly thought of my aunt who has been out of work since the end of last year. Shes been applying, going in for interviews but nothing has panned out. My parents have been helping her out financially as best they can but they can only help out so much.
ReplyDeleteWhen I called her to tell her what we were doing for her she was very shocked and grateful. She is a believer but this just re-affirmed to her that God is watching over her during this trying time. She was just starting to wonder how she was going to afford some of her monthly bills this next month and now God has once again provided for her.
Jennifer & Chris Leither
After hearing about and having the chance to volunteer with the Furniture Mission, we decided to use $100.00 of our money to buy items for the organization. We spent a morning at the Brandon City-Wide Rummages looking for goods. We are able to buy bedding, end tables, silverware, cookware and other things (a lot of them were even new!). We hope that the people who receive the items will feel the love of God.
ReplyDeleteJ & A
I cried as I opened the envelope because of the needs I had seen the day prior when we worked for the furniture mission. We delivered furniture to a young woman with 4 children who lived in a horrible looking apartment.there were no toys to be seen and the children were 5 and under. The place was very very small with no curtains but blankets up to the windows. I took a gift cert back to mom (she said she was going to use it for one of the childrens birthday) and two sacks of toys for the boys! they were ecstatic! My next stop was the Heart Hospital. My cousin who is late 60's was there with her husband who they thought may have had a heart attack. There are times they dont have enough to buy medicine in one month! She is on oxygen and carries a tank. She cried when she saw the money and told me this month she had already told the Lord, He would have to help because she didnt know what they were going to do. The last stop was a young single mother i know who has stopped going to church, in bad financial shape and cried and cried when she saw the 100.00 I gave her. I still have 225.00 left and am in prayer for the rest. Thank you for blessing me while I was able to bless someone else. One of my dreams was to give money away to the needy. What a treat!
ReplyDeleteHi everyone! Our family wanted to let all of you know how we will be using our Year of Jubilee money; and, also, if you are still searching for a cause we could definitely use your help!
ReplyDeleteThis past January, Shannon, 24 years old, left her abusive and unfaithful husband. With no where else to go, she and her two-year-old son Joey moved into her brother’s one bedroom apartment in Canton, SD. Shannon is also pregnant and is due May 23rd. In March, Shannon found a job waitressing at a local restaurant in Canton and has been trying to save some money for her new baby and a new life, but there just hasn’t been enough time. She is not receiving any financial support from her husband and is losing hope that she will be able to make it on her own, away from her unsafe marital situation.
This is where we can all help. With the new baby coming at the end of this week, there will be four people living in a one-bedroom apartment and Shannon will not be able to work for a little while until she recovers from the delivery. We are hoping that during her maternity leave, we can collect money to help her become a confident single mother. She does not have any sort of transportation right now (her brother and her have been sharing one vehicle), so this is one area where we could help. Additionally, we hope that we can help pay for a deposit and possibly first month’s rent at an apartment complex in Sioux Falls so that she can feel empowered to move forward with her new life and continue attending Hillcrest. Finally, with the new baby coming, she will have many needs ranging from groceries to diapers to clothing for her two children.
Right now there are two families committed to helping with Shannon’s situation, and, in this Year of Jubilee, we hope that some of you will feel compelled to help this struggling young woman get back on her feet and provide her with a safe environment to raise her children in. Thank you for reading about Shannon’s needs and please be praying for her and her family as the new baby comes! If anyone would like to help, please call Aimee at 605-929-8610. Thank you!
Last Friday a few middle school students jumped feet first into the Jubilee. After hearing about a seventh grade student at Whitter Middle School who was battling cancer, they decided to make a card and deliver a Jubiliee envelope to her and her family. This money will help with medical expenses, including a prostetic legg. Way to go students. Jesus put on flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood. If anybody else is interested in helping this family please let Richie or Adam know.
ReplyDeleteWow. My husband and I were shocked at what was inside that envelope. That's all we could think and talk about the whole day and week after. We both thought it was absolutely selfLESS and amazing at what the church was doing.
ReplyDeleteThe week before this, Coleton's brother had called us telling us that he and his fiance didn't even have enough money to pay for the food at their wedding, amongst other things. So when this money came, we decided to give them $250 of it to go towards paying for their wedding. The other $250 went to Muscular Dystrophy Research. My mom has muscular dystrophy and is confined to a wheelchair. I also have 3 aunts, 1 uncle and 2 cousins that have the same thing. For the past 10 years, they (the research center) have known what it was that their muscles are missing but just a few weeks ago were finally able to do treatments on two patients and it worked perfectly. So, in order for more people to get the treatment, it costs 2.5 million... so we figured at least we could help a little bit. We definitely do not have room in our budget to help out of our own pocket. We are SO thankful for this opportunity.
Thank you, Hillcrest. God is doing amazing things.
Coleton and Deserae Long
My husband wasn't in church with me the day these envelopes were handed out but together we made the decisions on who to give to.When I heard it was going to be a challenge I thought "whatever! how hard could it be?!" Well it was definately a challenge for us! To give with an open heart and without being judgemental about WHY our choices may need the money and putting it in God's hands, out of our controlwas tough! First off we gave some of the money to our neighbors. they have 3 children all with varying degrees of hearing loss, from mild to eventually deaf. This husband and wife work from sunup to sundown,also while she goes to school for ASL and the whole family tries to learn it. The remainder of the money we gave to various people with financial needs because of the economy, just gift certificates for groceries or gas. We did this all anonomously but still heard in a roundabout way some of the people's reactions and gratefullness and we were very proud and gracious to be a part of the Jubilee!
ReplyDeleteAmy and Andy
We have close friends who are going through some tough financial times. They have two young children, owe on last year's taxes, and are getting laid off in a couple months. When we first received the jubilee money, they immediately came to our minds, and so we gave them part of the jubilee money to use for bills, groceries, whatever they find to be the most pressing needs.
ReplyDeleteMy sister, who is disabled, has been out of work for a long time. Her unemployment benefits recently ran out. I said to Aaron, "If she wasn't my sister, we could give the money to her."
ReplyDeleteOf course, we came to our senses and helped her out with a particular bill. We're still looking for the right thing to do with the rest of the money -- I have a feeling God has a specific place for it to go.
Sheri & Aaron Levisay
What an amazing feeling it was to be given the opportunity to help someone in need! My six year old daughter Jasmine just happened sit in church with me that Sunday instead of going to Sunday School and she helped me and my other two children decide what to do with some of the money. We recently went to Wal-mart and ran into an old co-worker of mine who happens to also be a single mother. As we were standing behind her in the check out line she was telling me about her recent medical problems and medical bills, knowing how hard it can be I was trying to help her feel better when Jasmine tugged on my shirt and said "Mom we should give her some of that money from church." WOW! I thought, it is amazing that my six year old thought of that before I did! So we used $100 to purchase the $42 in groceries she had and had the cashier give her the change. It was amazing to do something like that and to witness the disbelief on her face when she said "You have no idea how much we needed that! Why would you do that?" and I responded "Because God loves you." I know we were able to touch the heart of that woman that day but I believe we also touched the hearts of the several people who gathered around us who shocked that we were able to give so freely.
ReplyDeleteOur family has decided to break our money into smaller amounts. To this point we have used 300 of it and are still deciding how we are going to spend our last 200. We recently saw an add posted on Craiglist.com where a man said he needed work and would do just about anything to get money. The next day we called him up and asked him if we could meet him somewhere. He was wondering if we needed work but we told him we just wanted to help him out. During our meeting he told us how he was recently laid off from his job out of town and had 400 dollars to his name and that money was going to his rent. He told us how he had screwed up in the past but had figured out his life and had a young daughter and wife at home. He told us he was so desperate for a job that he even went to McDonalds to apply to be the guy that holds up a sign outside of the restaurant. After talking to this guy for 15 minutes or so we handed him the money and explained our story at Hillcrest. He told us how he grew up going to church on and off and would like to get involved again. At that point he took my number and said he would like to go with us some time. About an hour ago I received an ecstatic phone call and he told me he had received 3 job offers in one day. One that was willing to pay him 14 dollars an hour. He said that he had previously worked at this place and a few days prior he went in again to see if they would hire him. They claimed they couldn’t due to the economy but today they called him back and said they would hire him. The best part about it was that he told me he didn’t have to work on Sunday’s and he would let me know about coming with us to church some time. It was such a great feeling for our family to meet with this guy.
ReplyDeleteAnother day we were driving by Walmart and saw some men holding signs We pulled in and asked them what they needed and how we could help them. They told us they had hitch-hiked here and now were trying to make some money for bus tickets to get to Minneapolis. They didn’t expect much from us and would have been happy with just a meal, but after explaining our story we gave them enough money for bus tickets and some food. They were so happy and gracious. They hugged us and then took off to buy their bus tickets. The feeling we got when helping these people was indescribable & brought tears to our eyes.
We feel extremely blessed to have had these opportunities & look forward to our next chance to give away the rest of the money.
Once again the Lord blessed me when, with the remaining 225.00 I had, I bought magazines for a person in a hospital with family out of town, gave an elderly person a 100.00, and last but not least 100.00 to help children who have Aids.
ReplyDeleteIt has taken us a while to use the Jubilee money, but we finally did it! I contacted the school that our children attend in Brandon and explained what our church was doing with the Year of Jubilee. I had a meeting with both the principal and the director of nutrition and they were very excited to hear that we wanted to give the money to them to use for families in our school that had real needs that weren't being met. I also explained that we didn't want the families to know who the money came from, but that we would appreciate if they told us what kind of needs were being taken care of with the money. I did explain that we wanted the money to be used for backpack buddies, school lunch accounts and/or school supplies.
ReplyDeleteMy husband and I both have thought at different times that we could use the money to meet our needs, but neither of us wanted to do it. We knew that we both would rather be a blessing to someone else, or in this situation many other families. While we could've used the money to help us out we chose not to. During our struggles over the past 9 months God has used our friends and family to provide for us when we didn't know how our needs would somtimes be met. Well, I took the Jubilee money to the school on Wednesday of last week and today as we left church a friend of ours gave us an envelope. When we got to our van and opened it we found their portion of the Jubilee money!! We will never forget how wonderful it felt to be the giver when we truly needed the money and within a matter of days be the recipient of such a great blessing! Thank you!
We decided to give our $500 to a help out a young couple our age. My high school classmate/family member and his wife have twin daughters who are 22 months old. In August, one of the twins was diagnosed with an extremely rare and aggressive form of pediatric brain cancer. She has already had a tumor surgically removed and now has a very tough fight ahead of her. She has started intensive, systemic chemotherapy and will likely have to follow with radiation, stem cell replacement and additional chemo. Each treatment will require a 4-5 day hospital stay. In order for her mom to provide the best possible care for her, along with her their other 3 children, she has discontinued working. This leaves the family with only one income. So, hopefully the Jubilee money will help to cover some of the family’s financial needs. We hope and pray God will take care of the rest.
ReplyDeletePatience Pays Off
ReplyDeleteRobert and I had been holding on to the Jubilee money for over 5 months. We both felt that if we continued to pray for God's leading, the right person, family, or organization who needed this gift would be obvious. I must admit that I was starting to feel anxious about "sitting" on that much cash for so long. I wondered if we would never have a clear sign and should just pick a local organization that we thought would use it wisely. Robert encouraged me to continue to be patient.
Just a couple days ago we learned that our new neighbor was suddenly admitted to the ICU fighting for life. The family is currently without health insurance and the parent in the hospital is the "bread-winner." Praise God - it now seems they will pull through, but might have a long recovery ahead. It was emotional for both me and the spouse when Robert and I explained how we came to have the $500 and now knew that it was meant for them. What joy there is in being rewarded for patience and trust in our Lord! Thank you elders, pastors, and anyone else involved in the development of this "Year of Jubilee!"
Robert & Jackie Heider
My husband wasn't in church with me the day the envelopes were handed out but I was so excited about the challenge that this "Year of Jubilee" money came with and wanted to use it to help someone in need. My husband shared my excitement and we both did not want to rush into giving it to the first person we saw. So after brainstorming and praying about it we were a little unsure but knew we didn't want to wait too long...in June (and I know I'm a bit late in writing about it) a coworker came to me (one whom I rarely see) and was telling me about some financial struggles she and her family were having. As I listened, I could feel that tug and then she said, "I just wish someone could loan me $500" . At that moment I just said, I will. She couldn't believe it and after I told her several times over, yes I will, in fact, I don't want you to repay me. God loves you and so do I, I said. She got tears in her eyes and still couldn't believe that I would. I knew that's exactly who God wanted me to give it too. I don't know why, but that's not important...God wanted me to listen to Him. Isn't He Amazing! What an opportunity!
ReplyDeleteWe were given the Jubilee money by a member of your church who knew we were going to China in fall of 2009 to teach English to university students in Henan Province. She challenged us to find someone to bless with this money during this past school year. Well, we have!
ReplyDeleteMy friend Pam started an organization in 2006 called Swallow's Nest to provide care for about 25 special needs orphans in 3 apartments in downtown Zhengzhou. These children are waiting for surgeries and/or adoptive placement with a forever family. As a nurse, I have been able to assist her with infant assessments, wound dressing changes, and other concerns. Pam and her family have challenged us to care for the 'least of these'. This money will go to offset the cost of surgery and the ongoing costs of formula and diapers. They are truly God's hands and feet.
Their website is: www.swallowsnestzz.org
Amazing stuff! Thank you for this opportunity.
Josh & Karen (and Levi) Christoffels
Zhengzhou, Henan Province CHINA