 WILLIAMSBURG — Through acts of kindness as diverse as building a home for a family in need to washing car windows, Kentucky Baptists fanned out throughout the Williamsburg, London, Corbin and Mt. Vernon areas this past week to send a message of love and hope.
More than 1,000 volunteers participated in Cross Over Kentucky, a community service effort planned as a lead-in to the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s annual meeting set for Nov. 12-13 at Cumberland College in Williamsburg.
Cross Over began on Wednesday when Baptist volunteers started a home construction project in partnership with Cumberland College's Mountain Outreach program. More than 40 volunteers worked on the house in the small community near London, completing it to the point of only needing inside finishing work.
Most Cross Over activities took place on Saturday. Starting the day with organizational meetings at Main Street Baptist Church in Williamsburg, the First Baptist Church of Mt. Vernon and the Corinth Baptist Church of London, volunteers fanned out to participate in a number of projects.
Rochell Goff, a student at Cumberland College, worked to fold and sort donated clothes at the Cedar Ridge Ministries thrift store in Williamsburg.
"This is just something small I can do to show somebody the love of Jesus," Goff said as she worked amidst a ceiling-high pile of clothing.
Other volunteers washed windshields in grocery store parking lots in Williamsburg and Corbin.
"I think it's a good thing we're doing," said Mike Lawson, a member of Calvary Missionary Baptist Church in Williamsburg, who brought a group of teenagers from the church to wash windshields in the Sav-A-Lot parking lot there.
"They were a little apprehensive at first, not knowing how they would be received, and I was too," Lawson said, adding that they were having a good experience. "A couple of people wanted to pay us but we just said 'no, we're not doing this for money.'"
A large number of volunteers went door to door through neighborhoods bordering participating churches conducting surveys to discover needs that the church could be involved in meeting in the future. Still others distributed free copies of a video about the life of Jesus.
A group from Main Street Baptist Church in Williamsburg also participated in a prayer rally on Saturday afternoon. The group walked from the church to the county courthouse, praying for the people of the community as they went. Once all arrived at the courthouse, the group held hands in a large circle and prayed as a group for the community.
Several area churches also scheduled special services during the weekend and distributed flyers inviting members of the community to attend.
This is the second time that the Kentucky Baptist Convention has sponsored a Cross Over weekend. More than 1,000 volunteers from 111 churches participated in the first Cross Over, held last year in the Purchase area of western Kentucky.
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release prepared by Robert Reeves, KBC Communications Director |