One in eight children in America struggles with hunger. Over 2,500 of these children live in Prince William County. Now, New Life Christian Church in Bristow is challenging residents to help those children.
New Life Christian Church, through collaboration with Generosity Feeds, the school system, businesses, nonprofits and local individuals, is looking to provide 10,000 meals to needy children in the area.
Jodi Navin is New Life’s Outreach Coordinator for the Generosity Feeds project. She has reached out to social workers and guidance counselors through Prince William County Schools to identify families in need. During the school day, these children can get free breakfast and lunch but on weekends, holidays and over the summer, their families struggle to provide food for their children.
“They know where their breakfast or lunch is coming from,” said Navin. “But they go home and often a parent or both parents are working.”
To help the children be able to cook a healthy, yet safe meal for themselves, New Life will be providing 10,000 packets of garden vegetable soup dry mix. The meal is FDA approved, includes a full serving of vegetables and can easily be microwaved or boiled on a stovetop.
“It’s a healthy meal supplement,” Navin said.
The soup mixes are individually wrapped and then put in a box that holds 40 meals. The counselors and social workers place an order for how many they need, often times providing 40 meals per child, because that is enough for children to have something to eat on every holiday of the school year.
“Sudley Elementary is getting 40 boxes of 40 meals,” Navin said, but it all depends on what the counselors have requested .
So far, Navin said that 250 boxes are spoken for, and now they are reaching out farther across the county. If all of those boxes are not requested in western Prince William and Manassas, they offer them to schools in Dale City and Woodbridge.
Navin said they intend to provide the meals wherever social workers and counselors say they are needed. Many of these employees work at different schools, and they also communicate with each other, so they are spreading the word through a network.
A core group of New Life Christian Church members plus 200 volunteers from the community will be packaging the meals on Mar. 30 from 1 to 3 p.m. at Piney Branch Elementary School on Linton Hall Road in Bristow, which is also where the church meets every Sunday for service at 9:30 and 11 a.m.
They have already fulfilled their quota of 200 volunteers within a few days through word of mouth and social media outreach. Navin said they have limited space to work in, so they cannot take any more volunteers to package, but people are welcome to volunteer to help church members set up from noon to 1 p.m. and tear down from 3 to 4 p.m.
However, most importantly, what they still need from people is to make a donation so they can afford to provide the 10,000 meals they promised. They are collecting donations of any nomination at their Generosity Feeds site.
Pastor Stan Rodda of New Life Christian Church said the Generosity Feeds project is in line with the church's mission, which is to be of service to the community.
“New Life Christian Church doesn’t exist for itself; we exist for other people,” he said. “One of our core values, core philosophies is that we want to impact others, and impact our community.”
Rodda said that New Life aims to be the kind of church that if “we went missing, people would miss out on stuff.” As such, his parishioners really are always looking beyond their immediate church community.
He explains that New Life is one church with two campuses. The first campus, in Chantilly, is a facility they call the “nZone.” It is a kind of community center that includes a gym and indoor field facilities, and thus offers multiple ways for the church community to come together.
As they have extended into the western Prince William communities, they chose to meet at a public school, because they felt it is a “safe place to discover God” especially for many people who may be intimidated by a more traditional church setting.
Rodda describes New Life Christian Church as a non-denominational, “casual, come as you are,” church. They are accepting of people and do not expect anyone to be perfect, but work together to become more Christ like.
Navin adds that they have an “awesome kids program” her children look forward to every week. Adults also form relationships with each other through the church.
“I’m happy to see those people,” Niva said. “It’s not just a Sunday morning relationship.”
Those looking to donate can visit generosityfeeds.org/va/bristow/166. Those looking to volunteer for set up and take down can contact Jodi Navin at jodin@newlife4me.com or 703-609-1216.
For more information about New Life Christian Church in Bristow or Chantilly, visit newlife4me.com, or visit them on Facebook or Twitter.
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