Facebook members - Please Vote!!!

A charity I've been involved with since the late 80's/early 90's was just selected by The Home Depot Foundation to be in the running for a $25,000 grant. The St. Louis Tornado relief worked really stretched their resources and then while that work was wrapping up, the Joplin tornado hit so $25 grand would mean a LOT!!! in continuing the relief efforts.

if you are on Facebook, I would greatly appreciate it if you would "like" The Home Depot Foundation page and vote for Service International. You can vote every 24 hours this month. https://www.facebook.com/homedepotfoundation

I'm telling you this long story so you understand why this is important to me in a completely shameless attempt at motivating you.

When we set up this charity, we really weren't sure what we were going to do with it yet. However, we knew that it was going to be important in some way. Then it happened. The levee broke in 1993 and all of Chesterfield was under water (including my church). We had no church anymore so we decided we were going to clean up Chesterfield Valley. For the first couple of days, all of the volunteers were from our church, then other churches, then other individuals, and community service groups. It was amazing. After we had been working for almost 2 weeks, The Red Cross showed up. I got called from the National Guard guys to come to the checkpoint. I was thinking "Oh Crap" but I got up there quickly. He said, 'The Red Cross is here and they want to feed people". I said, "We are already feeding not only the 1000 or so volunteers, but all the people who lived here". He said, "I know, but they are the Red Cross after all". I looked at the Red Cross vans and THEY WERE TICKED. A snot-nosed 25 year old was going to control if they even had access to the valley and the National Guard people had guns and they were going to enforce whatever decision I made. Obviously, I let them in because it was all about helping people. I have to admit, I was a little disappointed when I saw on CNN and other national news outlets how The Red Cross was on all of those stations and how they were feeding people affected so badly by this tragedy. Ummm, CNN, they had been there for half a day and they were primarily feeding their own personnel. There was the obligatory request for donations. There was no mention whatsoever of Service International who figured out, on the fly, how to give 1000 people tetanus shots, organize teams to go to certain areas, get them on the correct busses that were temporarily loaned, get the proper tools that were donated, etc. We didn't show pictures on the national news of the devastation and then get picked up on nationwide and get sent donations. The members of my church funded all of the costs involved. I truly hope that the Red Cross isn't always like this. They did a photo-op so they could ask for donations.....but they really didn't do diddly-squat.

Anyway....that's the start of "The Little Charity That Could" and why it's important to me. To those that think that $25 grand is nothing, I respond that it's $25 grand more than they have now. This charity is still supported by my church. $25 grand going in is $25 grand going out because they have no expenses. If you want to see some of the things accomplished, here's the link. Home, Service International - Pastor Jeff Perry

 

Liked

 

Thank you. Did you VOTE for Service International too?

 

How do you do that?

 

Liked and voted! I hope u guys win!

 

Its on that link after u like it shows u can vote

 

[VMEO][/VMEO]

When I logged in, there were 4 charities listed and you just had to put a check in the box next to one of them.

 

Okay thanks!

 

In a situation like this, there's really no losers. One way or another, Americans are going to be helped. In this situation that is near and dear to my heart, I hope we win as well.

 

For a fellow 3reefer? Any day! Liked and voted.