RLR: Real Life Rice
Stories from real life Rice Bowls
TM Campaign Coordinators – just like you!
“God Showed Me More!”
Linda Balsiger, Children’s Ministry Director
Hometown: Chippewa Falls, WI
Organization: Chippewa Valley Bible Church
How did you hear about Rice BowlsTM? What led you to do a campaign?
I learned of Rice Bowls in spring of 2008 at the Orange Conference in Georgia. I quickly learned that Rice Bowls sponsor an orphanage in Haiti and I was hooked. My family adopted two boys from Haiti and it has a special place in my heart. I immediately ordered 250 bowls for our church, not knowing exactly when we would do the campaign.
Who organized project ? What are their roles within your group?
I am the Children's ministry director at our church and pretty much led the way for this. I brought it to the senior pastor along with a vision of one month in the fall being focused entirely on world hunger and poverty. It took off from there!
Did you use any of the Resources from the website?
I think we pretty much used all the resources on website...we put the bookmarks in bulletins each Sunday for families to do at home and used many of the lesson ideas.
How did you publicize the campaign – before and during?
We put up the posters that came with the bowls about 3 weeks before we handed them out. Our senior pastor lesson on the first Sunday focused on organizations such as Rice Bowls and as everyone left the service that day, each family was encouraged to take one home. Each week we would bring up Rice Bowls so the people did not forget. Also gave suggestions like...”Take an orphan to lunch this week.” [That meant whatever you would have spent on yourself for a meal out would then be placed in your Rice Bowl.
What was the most challenging aspect part of your campaign?
Trying to get everyone on board with the same teaching on Sunday's...from Kindergarten through adult.
Was there any particular way ya'll prayed during this project?
I do know that as I looked more into poverty and world hunger that month as I searched for more activities, my prayers seemed to go alot deeper with the Lord than they had before. Even though I thought I already knew how devastating these things are…God showed me more !!
“Junk Change”: Making a Difference
Sarah and Abby, high school students
Hometown: Dawsonville, GA
Organization: Horizon Christian Academy
How did you hear about Rice BowlsTM?
My friend Abby went on a youth conference and there was a booth for Rice Bowls set up there. She came back and she showed me her rice bowl. I thought that was an awesome idea so we decided we should try doing it in our own school.
Who organized the project?
Abby and I both did! We publicize it, handed out the rice bowls, and answered questions.
What was the most rewarding part of this experience?
To break the rice bowls and count the change we needed more than just the two of us. So, we had the girls from our accountability group from church come together and help us. When we bagged all the coins and calculated the final number we were shocked! Being girls, we jumped around and screamed for a while. I am still amazed at how junk change can make such a difference!
What would you say participants learned through this project?
The biggest lesson learned through this was definitely that at any age any where in the world you can make a difference! You don’t always have to go half way around the world to change things you can do just as much when you’re at home digging through the cushions in the couch!
What advice do you have for others?
It definitely helps to have a lot of information to offer. Most people are very skeptical about where their money goes, and it helps to be able to provide them with all the appropriate info.
How did you publicize the campaign – before and during?
The posters on the website were very helpful! Hanging those up around the school and reminding everybody in homeroom about the due date of the rice bowls worked very well! The visual of the rice bowl itself was an awesome way to get people excited! I saw people on a daily basis carrying around their rice bowls.
How did you pray for your Rice BowlsTM campaign?
Our elementary chapel prayed over the filled rice bowls one day. We also reminded every home room to keep these hungry children in there prayers.
What else can you share about the project?
I was always amazed by the statistics the site shared about how little money can provide food for a child! I had no idea it could be this easy to help make a effort to end world hunger! After doing this project seeing how much I complain about "not having anything good at home to eat" broke my heart! I will always think twice now before I ever complain about food again!
What is next for your group?
Now that we have counted all the collected money we will announce it to the school in chapel! We hope to be able to gather some students at lunch to help pray over the collected money to ask God to do what he will with the food it will provide.
Valuing Generosity
Brandon Hibbard, Campaign Coordinator
Hometown: Indian Trail, NC
Organization: Elevation Church
How did it go?
Loved
it! This was a tangible, concrete thing the children could lay their
eyes on. Having the actual bowls was better than just having the
children bring in money or collect it in plastic bags. This was
something they could see and remember.
How did you start your campaign?
We did it as a four week campaign. On the first Sunday, we gave every child in our children's ministry a bowl.
How did you get so many bowls returned?
We
encouraged kids to fill up as many bowls as they could, returning full
bowls for another one (or several) each Sunday. So, we had three weeks
for returning bowls, though we had a good number of stragglers on the
weeks following the campaign.
What did you do to encourage participation?
In
our elementary age, we had a competition between boys and girls,
reporting who was winning each week. I think the competition concept
helped a lot.
We also had our creative department create videos to
use in our school age program – there was an overall one and a video
for each country. They helped excite the kids.
In our other ages
(babies through kindergarten), we did not do any special promotion,
simply gave them out. We did use an informational piece to parents in
all of our age groups that explained the concept, the organization, etc.
What advice do you have for others?
We've
found our best marketing is just to get our people (specifically
volunteers) excited. If they're excited, that will rub off on others
and it will essentially market itself. We made sure our volunteers were
excited and encouraged them to get the kids excited.
What was the biggest struggle?
We
expected about $500 of change and received over $2200! I don't think we
thought through how long it would take to sort, count, and roll all
that change. We did not want to take it to those machines in grocery
stores because it would cost us a pretty good amount. We had volunteers
in our office for hours working through them, so it was quite a
process. Next time, we would definitely invest in a coin sorter on the
front end to save everyone a lot of time.
Did the church get involved or just the children’s ministry?
Our
church really jumped on board with it. This is definitely a project we
would do again. Generosity is one of the core elements of the culture
here at Elevation and is especially important to our pastor. So for us
to have the opportunity to involve our kids and teach them the
importance of generosity was awesome!
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Sacrificial…but Not Difficult
Alison Walker, Children’s Director, Campaign Coordinator
Hometown: Commerce, TX
Organization: First United Methodist Church
Vacation Bible School 2008: Surfing the Scriptures
Dustin (left) is a 4th grader. He attended Vacation Bible School at FUMC-Commerce and filled his Rice Bowl!
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How did it go?
I loved it! This was a tangible, concrete thing the children could lay their eyes on. Having the actual bowls was better than just having the children bring in money or collect it in plastic bags. This was something they could see and remember.
How did Rice BowlsTM work in your Vacation Bible School?
During VBS, the children rotated to different stations. The last station of each day was a reflection time. The children talked with their group leaders over what they had learned. During this time, the leaders talked about Rice Bowls. We passed them out on Monday and the children returned them on Friday.
How did the leaders introduce Rice BowlsTM?
Group leaders took time each day and tried to help the kids understand who these kids, [in the Rice Bowls Partner Orphanages] really are and what their needs are. Our children really understood the difference they were making.
Did families get involved?
Yes, at home parents sat down and talked with their children about the project. It’s hard for all of us to realize how much we have here in United States. This was a chance to talk about it with young children.
How did your own kids respond?
Two of my own children participated. They really appreciated that they themselves could do this. Teddy is 9 years old and Charlie is 6. This was different from other projects. It wasn’t another thing were they got us to give money. They could give themselves, right out of their money. It was sacrificial, but not hard or difficult.
Did you have any problems?
We ordered 100 Rice Bowls, but we had over 100 children come to VBS! So, we asked some siblings to share. That way, every family had one.
Mrs. Hazel Toney’s Legacy
Linda Furr, Campaign Coordinator
Hometown: Clinton, LA
Organization: Bluff Creek Baptist Church
How did it go?
It was great! The best part was telling the children and the congregation of the over $700 collected.
How did you raise over $700 in spare change? How did you do it?
We average about 100 people on Sunday mornings. We handed out the 50 bowls we received, and 50 families participated and returned the bowls.
Did the children get involved? How about the adults?
The info I downloaded off the Rice Bowls website was used in our children's time. Our pastor talked about the issue and got involved as well. He used several of the statistics on Today’s Orphan Crisis in his sermon.
Why was your whole church so interested in this project?
Several years back, probably 10 to 15 years, we had a mission minded lady in our church, she has passed on to be with the Lord. She would hand out the rice bowls. So, they have a special place in the hearts of our members because of Mrs. Hazel Toney. We will be participating again!!
Students get a “Missions Mentality”
Jan Blurton, Campaign Coordinator
Hometown: Hays, KS
Organization: Encounter College Ministry
How did it go?
This was an awesome way for college students to give and connect with missions. We will participate again!
Why did you decide to get involved?
About 20 of us took a mission trip to Mexico. When we came back to Kansas, we really wanted to cultivate a missions mentality for the entire groups at home.
How did you distribute Rice Bowls?
We ordered 50 Rice Bowls. We gave them all out and about 45 of them were returned full of change.
What did your group get out of this experience?
I was incredible to see that we touched several lives with our change. As students, Encounter is full of individuals who want to live out their faith after completing school. But, if we stop and look at the little things, we can do so much in the meantime.
Melissa & Christiauna:
Taking Nothing for Granted!
Melissa, 12th Grade Christiauna, 10th Grade
Hometown: Orting, WA
Organization: Reach Student Ministry, Abundant Life Church
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How is it going?
Things are going great! The rice bowls have been a major hit at our youth group!
How did you get started?
Our youth pastor, Dave, just randomly asked a question a year or two ago. He said, “What can YOU do about World Hunger?”
Melissa says – I had absolutely no idea! We had long talks about it and they never stopped. I believe God has called me to work with the hungry and it just branched out from there. I found Rice Bowls, and I am working with the Orting Food Bank, where I live. My motivation my desire wanting to change lives.
How did you distribute Rice Bowls?
We have planted Rice Bowls in classrooms, homes, and the church. We distributed the rice bowls to just about everyone in the youth group and pretty soon here we are going after the church as a whole. We have given some to a few of my friends at school and another church also.
What was the hardest part?
I'm not exactly sure. Maybe bringing awareness to the people around us that hunger is real in this world and it's not something that you read about and see on TV.
What was the most rewarding part?
The most rewarding thing is knowing that we get to change the lives of others. Usually people want to be noticed for this stuff but we're just doing the behind the scenes work and that can be really rewarding! Just to let them know that we really do care.
What else have you been up to?
We just did a retreat about starvation, human trafficking, poverty and things like that.
Melissa was head of the starvation group. – One of my prayers was that these kids know that they are loved, they truly are, from people who don't even know them! My dream for them is to grow up strong and know how to overcome these battles and know that they are taken care of.
Got Any Advice?
My advice for others is don't take things for granted. We take so many things for granted and it sometimes makes me sick! We whine when we can't get that new shirt we saw at the mall when some kids only have one shirt to live in and it's more considered a rag, you know?