This day was a great example of service between two congregations of different religions all worshiping the same God. They worked together to achieve what would have taken too long a time to do alone and in the process we had the chance to learn from each other about our beliefs and life stories.
Members of the Sunderland Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints joined together with the members of the Chapel of Light on Cornhill Road in Sunderland. There was a mixture of adults and children working together to clear gardens, mop floors, clean walls and take over 100 bags of garden waste to the local scrap yard. The activity started at 10am and finished at 3pm, with many tired, but happy people.
The Church of Light congregation want to use the church for their community and provide somewhere to go for playgroups, learning and events. They needed help to clear the overgrown gardens and the main hall for preparations to open the church to the local community and also for their own worship.
The members of the Chapel of Light were overwhelmed with the support from another church and rewarded all the hard work with a KFC and lots of juice. We were lucky with the weather too, although rain was predicted, we actually had a good dry spell. The rain didn’t come until just after the last bag of waste was packed in the cars.
The children worked really hard and kept going for the entire time, never complaining, but always working together and laughing with each other. It was a strengthening experience for all involved and there was a lot of work achieved over the time we were there.
Peter from the Chapel of Light was delighted with the support and said:
"Thank you so much for your help. I can't believe how much has been done, this would have taken us weeks to do and we have managed it in a day working together. And the children, so many children working hard. You have good children in your church."
Amy Hansens said:
"It was a really fun day, really hard work but very enjoyable and it was great to see how everyone worked together. The people from their church were really appreciative and could hardly believe we had driven 50 miles to come and help."
Everyone involved in this experience enjoyed it and were pleased with how the church looked once we had finished. We hope that the friendship formed within this day of service continues for future events where we can continue working together for the community.