Volunteers from East Brainerd Church of Christ painted the entire exterior of an East Brainerd home for the widow who lives there — and did it for free.
Members of East Brainerd Church of Christ came several days in advance to power-wash the exterior and replace rotting pieces of wood before painting on Nov. 6.Last Sunday, a work crew of total strangers arrived at the home of an East Brainerd widow and painted the exterior of her home.
At the home of a vision-impaired shut-in, a volunteer crew cleaned house and organized pantry shelves to make them more accessible for her.
A crew of middle-school girls and their parents planted roses at Hunter Middle School. Adults walked the grounds of Chickamauga Battlefield, picking up enough litter to fill 30 trash bags.
And all these projects were done for free.
"How can you ever begin to repay somebody for that?" asked the East Brainerd homeowner, who requested her name not be used for safety reasons.
All the work was part of "We Are The Sermon," or WATS Sunday, at East Brainerd Church of Christ, a day when the 900-member congregation forgoes a traditional service in order to spread out across the city and do community service.
Nov. 6 marked the fifth year WATS Sunday has been held, according to Pastor Chris Barnett. It is always the first Sunday in November and was an initiative of the millennials in the church, he says.
"They came to our church leadership and wanted to look for ways that the church could be more 'outside the walls' of the building," Barnett explains. "They came up with this idea and said, 'Let's have one day a year that we remind ourselves what we are supposed to be about on a regular basis.' So we take the first Sunday of November and do multiple service projects around town."
Each adult Bible class is asked to come up with one or two projects. Some help church members, others are focused on community residents with needs known by members of the congregation. Barnett says all project sites are visited ahead of time by crew captains to verify need.
"We had people in their 90s all the way down to children helping last Sunday. We completed 19 projects," says Barnett.
To help the homeless, senior adults boxed shoes, which the congregation has been collecting to distribute through the Chattanooga Community Kitchen.
Two crews trimmed bushes, mowed and did landscaping at residential homes. Some of the church's youth held a free car wash at the church, while others baked cookies and delivered them to Elmcroft Assisted Living and Erlanger East.
Shan Fisher led the work crew of 45 sixth- to eighth-grade girls and their parents at Hunter Middle in Ooltewah.
"When we first got there, we said a prayer for the school, its teachers and for us to continue to have a servant's heart for helping others," says Fisher.
"We cleaned out a garden we had started last year, planted roses and other plants. There were so many of us that a couple of the adults and some girls picked up trash on campus, trimmed bushes and cleaned a second garden.
"We had five girls in our group go see a shut-in. They made cards for other shut-ins in her living room with her. They made cookies before they left, ate cookies with her and had a photo shoot in her back yard.
The joy of that experience was "so powerful" in one eighth-grader that she couldn't contain her exuberance, Fisher adds.
"She even suggested we do a week-long WATS or that, during one of the school breaks, we visit shut-ins each day that week," Fisher says, laughing.
Melissa McCollum led a group that painted the stage area, a piano and organized an instrumental storage closet at Barger Academy of Fine Arts on Brainerd Road. The church partners with the church for the Snack Pack Ministry, which packs and delivers weekend food packages to be distributed to children who are underfed or lacking food on weekends.
At Barger, the church group also "painted touch-ups in one hallway as well," McCollum says. "Our goal is to go back and paint all the doorways into classrooms over Christmas break."
Last Wednesday, as part of the Snack Pack Ministry, church members packed 4,000 food bags to be distributed to children in 14 schools during the remainder of this month and the first of December, adds Barnett.
The pastor says all WATS projects are undertaken with no expense to the recipients because "these are things people wish they could do; but are things we can and are doing."
"We're coming to help, and we aren't looking for any type of donations. There are just needs that need to be taken care of and we can help."
Contact Susan Pierce at spierce@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6284.