16 | September 2025
Evangelism Grants Enable Community Outreach Across Ohio Vacation Bible School, Hillside Church, Polk
God blessed our 2nd VBS since we launched Hillside. We averaged 24 with a high of 25. It was nice to see families walking to VBS in our town. One 12-year- old girl was saved and then baptized the next Sunday at our church pool par- ty. We had two visitors that Sunday and four the next Sunday. Our volunteers worked hard and were amazing. What a great spirit. Thank you SCBO for your partnership in prayer and financial assistance. – Pastor Mike Feliciano, Hillside Church
July 4th Block Party, Good Shepherd Baptist Church, Amherst The event was wonderful, and all of the volunteers walked away tired, yet sat- isfied, because we had over 100 people at the event, with 14 families coming from around our community. We got to serve our guests, feed our guests, and talk to our guests. Many of us spent time telling them about our church and what Jesus has done for us. Even after all the time, energy, planning, and work that went into it, our congregation is ready to do it again. They are holding on to the hope that if we can show our community the love of God, more of them will be willing to hear about his love and sacrifice too. – Pastor Gabriel Ray, Good Shepherd Baptist Church Back-to-School Bash, Elyria Church, Elyria Elyria Church’s first-ever Back-to-School Bash was great. Having it in our front yard drew the attention of our neighbors across the street. We had about 100 people show up. We grilled food, passed out backpacks of school sup- plies, and gave out additional school supplies. We also handed out teen bags for older students. Our Clothes Closet was also open. One single mom walked out with bags in her hands and tears in her eyes, saying, “Thank you so much. I was so worried about what we were going to do for school clothes this year, and here we got all our needs met for free.” The conversations throughout the event were great. Questions were asked about wanting to know more about the church, what classes we have and for what ages, what other events that we offer to the community, as well as asking about who God is and why He is so important. Pastor Josh was able to give a brief testimony and share the gospel. We let people know about our service times and our Trunk-or-Treat in October. It will be exciting to see who will show up at a Sunday morning service, as well as see if they will return to our next event this fall. – Pastor Joshua Hargis, Elyria Church
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