What an amazing turn out of support from our community! The Anchor Church has been offering a temporary emergency homeless shelter for the last seven years. We are in awe of God’s provision during these many years. Thank you to all of you that have given of your time, your resources, and your money. This has helped us to be open during those really cold nights. We typically open when it is going to be in the 20’s as a low. This last week, on the coldest night, we had 59 people in our emergency shelter. A special thank you to Trinity United Methodist Church for their generous hospitality and kindness.
I wanted to follow up and share from my heart after this emergency shelter. I will be breaking this up into three posts over the next three days. (1) I will talk about the community of Wilmington, (2) tomorrow I will pose a question: “does there need to be another permanent overnight shelter?”, (3) and Thursday I want to dream and imagine together what could be.
First of all, we live an amazing town. For much of Wilmington’s history this area has been known for racism, violence, and addictions. But I believe things are changing and God is making us into something new. My prayer is that we will become a town known for welcome, peace, and recovery. This prayer has to be lived out with what we do with our hands, feet, blood, sweat, and tears —– because it matters where we are standing, who we are standing beside, and what we are participating in. If you want to be part of this amazing town and learn ways to contribute to being a people of peace, a people of welcome, and a people of recovery, then I invite you to check out some of our mission work at The Anchor. The Holy Spirit is leading us to always invite people to participate with what God is doing already in our city ——- so we want to offer an invitation to be part of the story of God’s redemptive work. Click on this link and we will take you out to coffee and we will help figure out a way to get you involved. Below you can find six mission opportunities that we can discuss.
Please check back tomorrow for the next post that will ask this question: “does there need to be another permanent overnight shelter?”
Switchin’ Gears – our bike ministry that fixes up bicycles and gives them away to children in poverty and folks experiencing homelessness.
Hope Recuperative Care – a homelike environment that is provided to our homeless friends that are being discharged from the hosptal after an illness, injury, surgery, or chemotherapy.
Hope’s Lens – our art journal where our friends experiencing homelessness & poverty get their work published —– and they get paid for their work.
Welcome Table – our Thursday sit-down lunch that is an extension of the Lord’s Table, where we share food that is rooted in community.
Emergency Shelter – this is what we offer during cold days that get in the 20’s as a low.
CARE – affordable housing for folks that have graduated from a half-way house and want to continue to live sober and accountable lives. We own one house and three apartments and we are looking to expand this ministry.