|
 A healthy portion of our church budget is directed to support mission activites outside our local congregation, with over $35,000 of our giving last year directed to this end!
Members of our WPC community participate in numerous service activities, both within WPC and in the local community. Some typical examples include:
- Working with Habitat for Humanity
- The Wimberley ESL program
- The Village Thrift Store
- The Crisis Bread Basket program
- Picking up trash along local Wimberley roads.
Within our congregation, numerous members:
- Serve on committees (such as Fellowship, Property, Mission, etc.)
- Sing in our wonderful choir
- Teach a Sunday School class
- Serve as a youth sponsor
- Assist in worship (usher, lay liturgist, acolyte)
- Organize our annual Alternative Christmas market
Just to name a few!
Finally, we have a tradition of both youth and adult mission trips. The annual youth trip is always meaningful, particularly when the youth report back to the congregation on what they've experienced and learned at the "Mission Trip Luncheon" following worship.
Adult trips have been to Kenya, Africa and Guatemala. These trips have been a good combination of "hands-on" and relational activities and have been mountaintop experiences!
|
|
John Knox Ranch Partnership |
|
At the February, 2007 Session meeting, the WPC Session approved a "partnership" relation between WPC and John Knox Ranch (JKR), the Mission Presbytery camp just "up the road" from WPC. Many of our WPC members have been familiar with JKR for years because we or our children or our grandchildren have attended camp there. We also hold our annual church picnic each year on JKR's grounds, and the current director of the camp is Faith Collier, one of our own members. Many members have also volunteered there as camp counselors, camp chaplains, day-camp directors, or as part of a work team building new structures or repairing and maintaining older ones.
What the partnership means is that we are deciding to "step up" our interaction with
JKR in order to give ourselves ongoing opportunities for personal involvement in the
mission of Christ in this community, and because God has blessed us with resources
that are needed by John Knox to enable them to fulfill their ministry to us and so
many other congregations in our presbytery.
In addition to the money we give from our Mission budget, we will now have year-round
opportunities for things like serving on work crews, sharing our expertise in
the arts with summer campers, donating items like sunscreen and tennis shoes for
children without, and adopting a cabin to care-take in the Spring and Fall. There will
be some way(s) each year for those of all ages and all abilities and interests to take
part in this partnership.
|
|
This is a special program held each November. Many worthwhile organizations from the Wimberley area and around the world offer special items for sale at the church. These make excellent Christmas presents for church members and friends, while supporting local and worldwide mission.
|
|
