South Hills Partnership Ministries

I'm Dylan. I'm the senior pastor here at the South Coast Partnership for Hilltop, for Fairhaven and Spencer churches. I think it's very easy to forget about how much we're able to accomplish together as small churches, how much we do accomplish together as small churches. There is so much ministry that we do in Pittsburgh and that we help support around the world.

We're going to hear from a couple people on this video who are involved in ministries across all three churches. Some that each church does by itself, some that are shared across the churches, and I hope that you will be inspired by what you are contributing to, what you are giving to with your prayers, your presence, your gifts, your service, and your witness. There is so much good that is happening that we can really be proud of. Great things are happening at the Southwest Partnership.

We are accomplishing so much in the name of Jesus and for the Kingdom of God right here in Pittsburgh. - I am Robbie and I manage the small food pantry that we have here at Spencer Church. And I want to say first that our ministry, this little ministry, is doing quite well. Our pantry is funded through a line item in our budget.

And we have a wonderful shopper at our church, Bobbi, who really stretches the dollar as much as she can. But like everyone and everywhere, we all know that sometimes there is way more months than there is money. Our pantry is used by a lot of the community. We have had young families of immigrants, we have had the elderly, we have had handicapped people who have come to me or other people at our church, and they have just thanked us for the nice ministry that this is.

We have also had people in the community come and donate. They have either put things directly into the pantry or they have come into the church to Pat, have given her boxes of food. We have had monetary donations. So this ministry in my mind is really taken off and what it has done and what I think is so important is that for the people of this community, it has made the presence of God real to them.

• I'm Kelly and I go to Fairhaven United Methodist. We have several different missions that we have throughout for our church. We do the food pantry. which has been there almost seven or eight years now.

And I purchased the food for it from a line item in our budget. But we also have many people in the church and the community that drop lost food. We have seen all kinds of people using the pantry. And when I'm down there filling it, everyone who uses it stops and thanks us and says how wonderful it is.

So that makes me happy because I've worked with children whose parents have had difficulty with food and I know how important it is. We also do blessing bags at our church which again has been going on for maybe seven or eight years. We take all kinds of sample items like deodorant, toothpaste, the heating things you can put in your feet and your hands, all kinds of things. We place them in a Ziploc baggie, put a paper in there that tells them this is from our church.

If you need anything, there's a number that they can call. And the people take them from our church, they put them in their car, and if they see someone on the road that looks like they're in need, they can hand them the bag. Bags have been given out downtown Pittsburgh in Oakland. People have taken them on vacation and given them out.

And that's just another way to reach out to our community. We also have two clothing cupboards down at Fairhaven that we have in season clothes put in by several of the ladies, but everybody donates for that. We also see the community coming and donating for that. So all of these missions are serving the people around our church, and we feel that we're doing God's work by doing that.

Hi, my name is Jamie. I'm from Spencer. One of the chaired ministries we had is our Vacation Bible School. We've had it for two years with all the churches involved.

some amazing volunteers. We reach out to children both in the church families and in the outside community that are coming in. We learn about Jesus, we learn about God, we learn about love, and do it with a lot of fun and a lot of laughter. This year we wandered through the wilderness with a bunch of Old Testament and New Testament characters.

Again, we have a supper, we have crafts, we have games, we have a discovery area. We have, in fact, this year we actually had a campfire because we were out in the wilderness. So it's a wonderful time for the leaders, a ministry by all the leaders in the different churches. and for the children.

And we're reaching kids, in some cases, they've never been in a church, they've never heard about Jesus. They've come because it looks interesting and they've learned something new. So it's a great reach out to all these kids, as well as those that come back and back and really are close to God. Hi, I'm Ben Lehman.

I go to Fairhaven. I'm part of a group that coordinates one of our newest ministries and outreaches here in the South Hills Partnership, the Hilltop Table. The goal of the Hilltop Table is kind of give a new perspective on church to people that maybe don't attend regularly, and also to help build community in an area that seems to really be in need of it. So the way that we're facilitating that is once a month having a dinner at the Hilltop Church.

And we get all kinds of members from the community come and participate. And following the dinner, we'll have a brief scripture lesson and then a period of discussion. where it's sort of pretty open-ended. Everybody just kind of discusses what we talked about and what it means to them.

So for me, I've really enjoyed the new perspective on church, sort of a break from that traditional regimented worship service And it's nice to interact with people and see how they interpret what we're discussing. And that helps give me a new way to look at things. And I think through that I've really grown in my experience. understanding and relationship with God.

My name's Lou Ann and I'm with the Hilltop United Methodist Church and I'm going to hear talking about the Christmas Store. This is our fourth year of doing the Christmas Store. The Christmas Store is about helping the community, serving them with gifts that are over 90% off. This is for working families from minimum wage to approximately $20 an hour.

that families come in and just enjoy a blessing. There's two blessings through this, not just for the families that are receiving it, but also for the churches itself. That is one of the things I feel that God gave me on my heart was it's involving the entire church to get involved in an outreach that not only they get to witness a blessing, they also receive the blessing from just serving. My personal experiences that I have seen and witnessed is more of watching the joy of the congregation serving in events that I don't think they've served it before and they got that blessing, but also watching parents that come in in tears with their hearts just totally broken because there they are, we're giving to them something that they've never received.

And so I think this is a way of them looking at a church that in a different view that we are giving. I would like to say if you have never been a part of the Christmas store, you should try to volunteer. We do, you know, greeters, we do food, we do money takers, we do hostessing. So there's so many different parts, wrappers, you know, we have cookies that you have to, but if there's something that you can at least try.

You not only will bless others, but the blessing will come back to you.