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LYNCHBURG — A missions team from West Lynchburg Baptist Church in Lynchburg recently prepared 2,622 meals — in a little over an hour and a half. It’s the second time in the past six months that members have collected money and packaged meals at the Lynchburg Sharehouse for Stop Hunger Now. The meals the team prepared were sent to feed school children in impoverished Haiti, where 76 percent of the population lives below the poverty line and 56 percent live on less than a $1 a day.
Stop Hunger Now’s volunteer-based meal packaging program, Operation Sharehouse, has a significant role in feeding the world. The assembly process combines rice, soy, dehydrated vegetables and a flavoring mix including essential vitamins and minerals into small meal packages. The meals are vacuum packed and can be stored up to five years. Recipients prepare the meals using boiling water, which ensures a hot meal and purifies the water that in many areas around the world may be contaminated.
Team members (left to right): Nancy New, Joe Ferris, Elizabeth Harris, Joyce Linkswiler, Lillian Wright, Patsy Leftwich, Robert Putt, John Harris, Edna Krebs and Faye Henson stand in front of cartons of packaged meals prepared at Operation Sharehouse in Lynchburg.
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Each member of West Lynchburg’s team was assigned a job. Some poured the rice mixture through a funnel into a bag. Other members weighed the bags and one team member boxed them for shipment.
“Our group had such a good time doing this project that we’ve decided to do it again,” says team member Elizabeth Harris. Their next packaging event will likely be on a Saturday, giving adults who work on weekdays and the church’s youth an opportunity to participate.
Additional information on Stop Hunger Now is available at www.stophungernow.org.