We invite you and your family to join us for Christmas and Advent

Opportunities at Our Doorstep

InnVision
InnVision focuses on empowering homeless and at-risk families and individuals. Our contribution is vital in this tough economic time because of cutbacks in funds from Silicon Valley firms. InnVision addresses the multiple needs of people in transition, including food, clothing, showers, laundry, healthcare, transition housing, job training and many other items. InnVision programs reach throughout Santa Clara and San Mateo counties and serve more than 20,000 people each year at 20 different sites.

Green Pastures
For children with developmental disabilities Green Pastures, a local mission project in Mountain View, has provided a home — a safe place, a haven to learn and grow with and individualized care — for more than 20 years. Green Pastures is remodeling the original home in Mountain View to serve the children better. The children currently are housed in the Green Pastures Next Step Home which will later house additional children and youth.

EPA CAN DO
East Palo Alto Community Alliance & Neighborhood Development Corporation (EPA CAN DO) focuses on affordable housing development and management for individuals and families, including those who have encountered troubled mortgages. In the last few years EPA CAN DO has guided over 250 families in modifying their loans and has counseled hundreds of others in home buying.

Ecumenical Hunger Program
Located in East Palo Alto, Ecumenical Hunger Program (EHP) works with families throughout our area to eliminate their hunger and break the cycle of poverty. EHP provides food, clothing, household goods, and referral services. By providing its programs with compassion and respect, EHP promotes the personal dignity of those it serves while encouraging self-reliance.

Ministers’ Discretionary Fund
This fund allows our pastors to confidentially provide small gifts of money to congregation members in financial crisis and to the increasing number of jobless and homeless people who come to our church for help. Our pastors depend on the fund so that no one in need will be turned away empty-handed.

YWCA Support Network (for victims of violence)
For 30 years, the Support Network has given help and hope to people caught in domestic violence, providing counseling, shelter, support groups, legal assistance, a children's program and a volunteer program. In fiscal 2010 they assisted 1,132 clients with 16,235 counseling and case management sessions plus 7,683 advocacy, information and referral services. Our gifts will help maintain these vital services.

Global & Regional Outreach Opportunities

Heifer Project: Kids for Kids
Somewhere in the world, right now, children are tending to their goats. Goats and children go together well: one dairy goat can provide a family of four with enough milk to drink for a year and plenty leftover to sell. With this income, many children will be able to go to school. Gardens fertilized with goat manure yield more crops. Help provide “Kids for Kids” in many different countries. ($120 provides a goat and training in its care.)

Maua Methodist Hospital: Kenya
For several years First Church has continued to help the Maua Methodist Hospital in Meru, Kenya to expand its Community Health Outreach Program to several outlying communities where no such services were available. This staff cares for AIDS patients and provides HIV prevention education, family planning information, immunizations, malaria prevention services, TB testing, and more to the communities. In 2006 several of our youth and Stephen Black visited this hospital to work on projects there and gave us a first-hand account of the hospital’s vital medical outreach.

Persons in Mission (PIM): Mexico
The Santa Elena School and Children’s Home in Mexico serves Tarahumara Indian children, improving their lives through education, a balanced diet, hygiene, medical attention, and growth in the Christian faith. The short-term goal is to have more of the children at Santa Elena complete the six grades offered to them, and to continue their education at the public senior high school in nearby Creel. The school directors are UMC Persons in Mission (PIM). Supporting a PIM is part of our commitment to be a Global Mission Partner.

Sierra Service Project
Sierra Service Project is a non-profit organization providing life-changing experiences through acts of service repairing homes in Native American and urban communities, and building homes in Honduras. Each summer, approximately 1500 teenagers, 250 adult volunteers and over 40 paid summer staff live, worship and work together on different project sites. Their work results in more than 130 safer, drier and more comfortable homes each year. Program fees cover about 85% of SSP’s expenses. The remaining 15% of costs are covered by donations from congregations, individuals, and grant-making organizations.

Missionary: Paul Jeffrey
The First Church budget provides $2500 to support Paul Jeffrey, a missionary with the UMC General Board of Global Ministries, who works as a photojournalist traveling throughout the world, documenting the work of the church. This Joy Of Giving provides additional support for his award winning work. Paul is a senior correspondent for Response, the magazine of United Methodist Women. He also provides coverage of emergencies for Action by Churches Together, a Geneva-based global alliance of churches responding to disasters. Paul has filed stories from more than 70 countries in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia.

Click here for the Joy of Giving information brochure and donation form.

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