Churches of Christ Disaster Relief Effort

Carolina and I just got back from spending an interesting half of our day volunteering with the Churches of Christ Disaster Relief Effort on Allied Drive, here in Nashville. If you are a wealthy person (or not so wealthy), looking for a charity that actually does some good with your donations, I don't think you could do any better than this organization. They have very few paid people on staff. I'd say at least 90% of their work force is people who volunteer.

Generally, they have work days on an as-needed basis, depending on when disasters strike. We were working today to prepare and ship 1,200 boxes to people in the West who have been hit with recent flooding.

We participated in a huge assembly line. I think Carolina and I were the two youngest people there by at least 20 years, but we still had a great time working and visiting with everyone around us. It's really encouraging to see how many good people there are in this world who can work together so well. People were there from all over Tennessee, and I met several who drove down to help from Kentucky. If you could give up part of a day now and then, and you're close to the Nashville area, this is a great way to volunteer your time. They even provide lunch for everyone after the job is done!

On a separate note, several TV crews showed up to get clips of us in action. Fox 17 was there, and so was CBS 5 I think. The interesting thing was that mayoral candidate Bob Clement also showed up. He walked around and shook hands with the men who were in charge. I was hoping to see how anxious he is to "serve" Nashville, but he was primarily interested in eating a Nutty Buddy, which they gave him. So today, I guess he was serving the city of Nashville by helping to keep the ice cream business in operation, though he didn't help us pack up any boxes to be sent to the needy. He seemed like an OK guy, but he's definitely a politician; showing up right after the cameras did.

So far it's been a good day. I got to help get needed supplies to 1,200 different families, and I got to watch the possible Mayor Elect of Nashville eat ice cream while I worked.