Future location of the Community Garden.

A couple of years ago I attended a workshop of Long Island Council of Churches, and learned about a vital ministry to serve the community: a community garden. On Long Island some nonprofit organizations and churches have community gardens and provide fresh vegetables to needy people and to soup kitchens. Dix Hills United Methodist is one of them. I discussed this ministry with a few church members. They were enthusiastic and started organizing it. Then our church member Jacob Morabito offered to build the community garden as his Eagle Scout service project. His project plan was approved by our Board of Trustees in March and by his Scout board in April.

Jacob had a car wash fund-raiser with other Boy Scouts one Saturday in April. Now they plan to build two 4 feet by 8 feet garden boxes on the west side of the church building this month. That location is the best place at our church to get enough direct sunlight. Also it is a good visible location for customers who come to our thrift shop and those who use our church facility for their weekly meetings. Some of them may be interested in helping with our community garden.

I am excited about the community garden. We will be able to provide fresh vegetables to our Helping Hands families. Our church had the Daniel Plan sermon series and Bible study during this year’s Lent. We learned that we need to eat real, whole food such as vegetables, fruit, whole grains, beans and nuts instead of the factory-made processed food which contains high fat, high sugar, high salt, high calories, and much less nutrients. We learned that to maintain our health, 50% of our food plate for each meal needs to be vegetables. Science tells us our bodies cannot store water-soluble vitamins or can only store small amounts of them. Those vitamins are vitamins B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B12, biotin, choline, folic acid, and vitamin C. Vegetables provide all of them. That is the reason why we need to eat 3–5 servings of vegetables per day.

Our Outreach team provided more vegetables and fruit to our Helping Hands families through our Easter basket project this year because of what we learned from the Daniel Plan. I am so proud of my people! We can provide fresh vegetables to them in summer and fall from this year on.

Now, we need volunteers to grow vegetables for our Helping Hands families in our community
garden. Jesus says, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (Matthew 9:37–38 NRSV). God has already answered my prayer. Sue and Pat Nestler will help us. Pat has grown vegetables and herbs in their home garden for five years. He knows how to raise vegetables very well, and is willing to support our community garden. I would like to volunteer once or twice a month to pull weeds or anything.

This is to give the LORD food when He is hungry. I ask you to pray for our Community Garden. I hope God will guide you to volunteer for it. A sign-up sheet for the Community Garden team will be in the Narthex in May. Join us in this new ministry! Amen.

With Faith, Hope, and Love in Christ,

Susumu