The Beginnings of Living Water

Julie Simmons asked me to share the beginnings of Living Water Benevolence Ministry, Inc. with you. So here it is:

Andy, my visionary husband, had a dream about 10 years ago to begin a benevolence ministry in Borger in which all of the evangelical churches could participate. At the time, Andy was the youth pastor at First Baptist Church. But he also handled the benevolence in our church and he was very frustrated at the amount of time that ministry consumed. He was also frustrated knowing that people in need were having to go from church to church to get the help they needed to pay one bill. So Andy brought the need before our deacon body and asked them to consider beginning this ministry. But it sat on the table for about 5 years. Andy is a visionary, but he's not a "make-it-happen-kind-0f-guy." But a man in our church, Conny Moore, was the person who made it happen! He knew who to go to to get the papers filed and how to get people involved to make it happen. He was incredible (still is!). He got the men in our church very excited about the ministry and they sent letters to every evangelical church in our community asking them to join us. Soon, a woman in our church donated a building to us to house Living Water. But it needed a lot of work and we had men that worked on this building for months getting it ready. They hired Vonna Humphries as our first Executive Director and formed a board and established the by-laws. By October of 2003, it was off and running! At first, it was just First Baptist Church that supported this ministry. But soon, other churches saw the benefit of having all of the benevolence resources in one place and began contributing and volunteering. Soon, we had 7 churches involved. And then in about 2006, Conny took the initiative to apply for money from United Way. We began receiving about $10,000 a year to use to buy food and help pay utility bills for our clients. Vonna stepped down as Executive Director in February of 2007 and I stepped in.

I became the full-time Executive Director of Living Water in March, 2007. I have loved it! Living Water helps people with a limited amount for utility bills. We also provide food every Friday for those in need. The only prerequisite is to provide us with a Social Security card for everyone in their household. They can come for 10 weeks and if they still have a need after those ten weeks, they have to provide us with a letter from a pastor saying they still have a need. Our objective is to get them involved in a church. We have a wonderful clothing room that is set up like a department store. People can come and "shop" for clothing once a month. And actually, everything at Living Water is free. When K-Mart closed in Borger, they donated our shelving units and clothing racks. J.C. Penney donated our hangers. We also have a chapel service on Friday mornings before we hand out the food. Most of our salvation decisions are made in that service or when I counsel people as I help them with their utility bills.

We purchase our food from High Plains Food Bank in Amarillo at $.16/lb. Quite a bargain!!

Last June, we were hurting financially. In fact, one week, we had to put a sign on our door that we had no money to help with utility bills. But since then, we had a former client donate money to buy turkeys for everyone at Thanksgiving and that seemed to challenge everyone in their giving to Living Water. God works in mysterious ways, doesn't He? It's been so much fun to be at the center of this ministry and see what God does day in and day out.

Before I became the director, I'd been praying that God would put me in a place where I would be around lost people--and where I could share my faith. Has He ever answered!!