Each winter season, Roof Above coordinates the Room in the Inn (RITI) program where area churches and organizations help house neighbors experiencing homelessness overnight. Sardis will host Room in the Inn guests 1-2 times a week in January-March.  

INSTRUCTIONS: Each day during Advent, purchase one of the items on the calendar or use the prayer or fact about homelessness for reflection. Drop off donation items to the Mission Corner blue donation shelves in the Gathering Place by January 8th.  *Please ensure all donation items are new, unused and in their packaging. 

Mission Support for Immediate Relief and Long-term Affordable Housing Goals

This November Missions ministry allocated some of their remaining funds to support emergency needs and relief in Ukraine through Presbyterian Disaster Assistance. If you would ever like to give to Presbyterian disaster assistance you can always select that on the drop-down menu on the Sardis giving page or directly through PDA. 

Mission ministry also elected to begin setting aside funds each year to support an affordable housing initiative in our local community (specifics TBD). 

Sardis Meets Requirements to Apply for Earth Care Congregation Designation

It’s been an eye-opening six months for the Earth Care team, as we investigated the requirements for earning the PC(USA) Earth Care Congregation designation. Through discussions with church staff and members involved in worship, education, outreach, and facilities, we’ve discovered that Sardis Presbyterian is actively engaged in nurturing and preserving God’s gift of creation. The High School youth annually clean McAlpine Creek where it crosses Sardis Road, and Sunday school classes have begun exploring Earth Care. For years, the facility staff have implemented energy saving measures. In 2022, an intentional earth care component was incorporated into worship through prayer, songs, and readings. We even purchased sustainably sourced greenery for Palm Sunday. We are pleased to announce that Sardis has met the requirements to apply for the Earth Care designation. In 2023, we look forward to broadening the Sardis impact on caring for our earth through new creative and intentional efforts. We welcome your ideas and soon will ask for interested individuals to join one of the four Earth Care subcommittees: Worship, Education, Outreach, and Facilities. Watch for those opportunities in the weekly email. Feel free to contact Shannon Klug with your questions.

Have You Used the New Mission Corner Donation Shelves Yet?

The Mission Corner in the Gathering Place is the new donation site for donation collections like Angel Tree gifts, Reverse Advent Calendar items, clothing drives, and Loaves & Fishes/Friendship Connection donations.

We are always collecting canned food donations for Loaves & Fishes/Friendship Connection. Please only drop-off donations of items on the priority needs list. We are unable to except any other donations outside of what is on the priority needs list, or for the specific drive we have going on at the time.

Room In The Inn Neighbors Need YOU!

We need YOU to make the difference! Sardis will host Room In the Inn on Sundays and Wednesday from January through March 2023. We plan to get 13 neighbors out of the cold for 26 nights, but we need your help! This is a limited volunteer gig,

but very rewarding. There are so many ways YOU can make an impact! To house our neighbors, we need team members to staff our fabulous Sardis House on Wednesday and Sunday nights from 5 pm to 8am. These are the two nights that ROOF ABOVE finds hardest to staff, because of other churches’ activities. Join a team and you will be asked to help 2-3 times in the 3-month period. Our neighbors need:

• 5 p.m. - 10 p.m. Greeters: Help settle guests in rooms, coordinates laundry, and serves as a general welcoming presence.
• 10 p.m. - 5 a.m. Overnight Hosts: Settle everyone in for the night, sets up breakfast in the morning (Overnight hosts are hard to find. Please consider doing it once or twice. Stretch your volunteer-self).
• 5 a.m. - 8 a.m. Closers: Help get everyone packed up and out the door, rides the bus back to Roof Above with the driver, cleans up.

Ready to make an impact? Contact Kay Taylor (704.975.2588)

or Sallie Crossley (704.650.5270).

How Else Can You Help?

• Join or Form a Group to Feed the Neighbors: Contact Jane Tilley (704.847.0191) if you are interested in this opportunity.
• Make lunches for the neighbors for the next day. Sign up genius to come.
• Make the 13 beds before Sunday night and Wednesday night. Sign up genius to come.
• Support the Reverse Advent Calendar with supplies for the neighbors.
• Pray for this ministry- our neighbors and our volunteers.

Sardis Serves Together

Save the Date! Join us for Sardis Serves Together on Sunday, January 29 from 10 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. We will have a day of worship, education and mission for ALL ages of children youth and adults. We are partnering with Families Forward for this event and our mission project will help pack weekend food bags and essential baskets for hundreds of families and children. Worship will occur at 10:00 a.m. in the Sanctuary followed by lunch, Sunday School, and hands on mission projects in the Fellowship Hall. There will be specific activities to engage even our youngest preschool and elementary school children.

Sardis Serves Together is a new term we are using for events like “Give One Day” where the entire Sardis community comes together to serve alongside our mission partners. We hope these events, whether they partner with a local organization like Families Forward or an organization like Rise Against Hunger, will help us understand our mission more deeply and equip us to serve together all year long.