Service Squads bring new life to Sunday school
Like many small rural churches, the Paradise United Methodist Church just north of Kansas City was concerned about its Sunday School program. “We had a small adult class, an equally small youth class and very few children,” said Peg Berger who chaired the Education Committee. “So we met early in 2009 and discussed several options, one of which was to trial a Service Squad program. The idea was to have everyone who attended Sunday School work together on various mission projects.”
The overall goal was to interest whole families in working on mission projects, not only for the local congregation and community, but for the Kansas City area and beyond. The program began in September and each week’s project started with a Scripture lesson relevant to the mission task. “For instance, the week we prepared packets for prisoners at the Cameron Correctional facility, we read stories about those imprisoned in the Bible and discussed the various reasons why people are incarcerated,” said Angie Vanderpool, who led the class that Sunday.
Other projects have included preparing boxes for soldiers serving in Afghanistan, assembling relief kits for Haiti, tying blankets for nursing home residents, making sandwiches for the community’s Restart Program, delivering flower bulbs to homes near the church, baking chicken-pot pies for the Ronald McDonald House, and planting flowers around the church property.
“We kept track of the value of each project for the year-end reports to the Conference,” said Tooti Roe, another of the class leaders. “The boxes for soldiers averaged $100 each, but because everyone in the church contributed items, the main expense was postage.” This was true on many of the activities. In fact, between September and the end of April approximately $4,750 was distributed by the Service Squad. This was above and beyond the congregation’s usual mission work and did not decrease the giving in other areas. “The impressive part is that for a church that averages between 40 and 50 in worship, most Sundays we had 20 working on the Service Squad projects,” added JoEllen Lincoln, another of the class leaders. “All age groups were able to work together and get to know one another.”
Recently, the committee met to critique the Service Squad concept and agreed to continue the projects on two Sundays each month, with regular lessons and fellowship activities on the remaining Sundays. If you would like to know more about this program, contact Pastor Arlin Renfrow at 816-781-4054 or by email.
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