Assembly Church works to feed the Columbus community
This is one of the biggest weekends of the year for buying and eating food. But while many families are planning a super spread, others worry about how to put food on the table every day.
COLUMBUS, MS. (WCBI) – This is one of the biggest weekends of the year for buying and eating food. But while many families are planning a super spread, others worry about how to put food on the table every day.
One church in Columbus worked to meet that need.
They pack bags with foods that so many people take for granted.
Every item in these bags can stretch a budget for a family in need.
It all started 3 years ago. The Assembly Church in Columbus began a monthly food drive.
Outreach Pastor Andy Setiawan said they want to be able to help families.
“Food is essential. And some people nowadays you know with inflation and everything groceries are hard to come by for a family. Especially for a family of nine or a family of six. So we hope that we can help them physically with the free groceries every once a month. We also educating people how to cook and eat healthy so that’s the goal right there just to just to bring just to bring goodness to the community through meals,” Setiawan said.
They receive the food from the Mississippi Food Network. Giving them enough to feed 250 families every month
Although they have enough food, some months they struggle having enough people to help during the food drive.
“The hardest part is to find volunteers. That’s the hardest part always. Today we are overflown with volunteers, we are extremely grateful but there’s a time there’s a time when we only have six or seven people but we still run it,” Setiawan said.
Angela Howard volunteers here as often as she can. She said she wants to give to her community in the same way it gave to her.
“People that are hungry in the community that’s like barely making ends meet you know with their finances. So when they come here they are able to get what they need um they can get their fellowship they can get prayer and if we can just help them with what they need or point them in the direction where another service might be able to help them. When we were younger we went through the same thing so I just wanna give back to the community that helped us,” Howard said.
Assembly Church holds a food drive on the second Saturday of the month, just bring your valid Mississippi ID or Driver’s License.
