“This year, we wanted to spend less and give more,” said the Rev. David Smith, senior pastor at the Centerville church. “We wanted to spend less on a concert and give more to the community.”
So, this past weekend, Dec. 11-12, in four services they called the Christmas Gift, members of the congregation gave away 1,300 backpacks they had filled with food, toiletries, other essentials and small gifts to members of the Target: Dayton! Ministries.
Target: Dayton! Ministries is a church for the poor and homeless in Dayton. It was founded by former Centerville residents Mark and Cindi Stevens.
“My husband is a pastor and he and I were teaching piano above Elsa’s Mexican Restaurant,” Cindi Stevens recalled. “We began to seek the Lord more and more, and wanted to do more what he was wanting us to do.”
The couple opened Target: Dayton nine years ago. The not-for-profit church has seven services a week and serves hot meals to its members. In 2009, the ministry served more than 50,000 meals.
The ministry also has a choir, made up of people who are or who have been homeless.
The choir not only sang with the Fairhaven choir and Christian vocalist Mark Harris at the Christmas Gift event, but the two local choirs recorded a song with Harris.
The song, “Love Has Come,” was written by Harris for this event and can be downloaded for free on the Fairhaven website at www.fairhavenchurch.org/christmas.
Any donations made in concert with the song will go to Target: Dayton.
Smith said that Fairhaven plans to give back to the community every Christmas.
“We want to be a church that’s not just in the community, but that is part of the community,” Smith said. “We want to make people’s lives better because of our love for God.”
Longtime Fairhaven member Pendra Lee Snyder said the experience of providing the backpacks and sharing the holiday with Target: Dayton has been exciting.
“It does something for you to be able to give,” Snyder said. “Giving is always better than receiving.”
For more information or to help Target: Dayton! Ministries, visit www.targetdayton.com.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7325 or jikelley@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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