Zion Lutheran Church LWML - Augsburg Food Pantry

Everyone is someone. This is why every third Saturday of the month we open our doors to a waiting line of people who have traveled to the food pantry, possibly on their last $5 hoping to get good nutritious food to feed their most valuable assets, their families. We meet them, hear their stories and pray that the small amount of food we can provide them will get them through this hard time. We can only hope the next person in the line is not the last person we will be able to help? Would someone help them if we couldn't? What about their children, and/or elderly parent? Will they just be hungry this month? The main task of the Lutheran Women's Mission League is reaching out and helping others. However, with the food pantry we find that many people reach out to us. In the beginning the food pantry served those in emergent need by calling a member of the LWML. About 3 years ago the LWML decided to open one Saturday a month for 6 hours to meet the new regulations from the Little Rock Food Bank, where we purchase food. We advertised by word of mouth and one article in the newspaper however in just a short time we did not need to have any advertisement to the community. People began sharing the valuable information to those in need. On the first few Saturdays we would have about 10 families and could prepare the boxes as the people arrived however, it has become such a large project we have prepared boxes prior to their arrival and add in extras to meet the family's needs. Now, in 2012 we regularly serve 60 to 80 families or 200 to 250 people a month. And often are able to participate in the backpack program at Dover Schools, serving about 50 a week. Again, everyone is someone. We do not discriminate against anyone based on religion, age, race, creed, income, etc. We help anyone who comes to the food pantry asking for help and leave it to the person to be honest not us to judge the need. Most food pantries do require financial information to receive food however this is not true for our food pantry. We ask age, number in the family, employment status and if this is their first time to the pantry. These are required by the Little Rock Food Bank. But it also does allow us to try to adapt the food box to meet the person's specific needs. At the pantry we often have large families with young children and we try to put foods in the box that children will like and are easy to prepare for themselves. The same is true for the elderly people who come to the pantry with special needs. This is personal to each and every one of us. This is OUR community and the next person in line could be a member of the Zion or a member of our family who is in need.