HARVEST RESOURCES Thank you for supporting Embrace the Middle East and our vital work with refugees this Harvest. In this pack are ideas and resources for Harvest services including fundraising resources, service ideas, prayers and colouring sheets. You can use these to raise money for Embrace the Middle East alone or to complement your support of local charities. How to use our Harvest hamper gift tags To make the most of our resources during your Harvest service or supper, we suggest that you set up a table or area to sell the Harvest hamper gift tags. Print out and display the Harvest hamper poster to grab people s attention and explain what the hampers are for. 1 Get your whole church involved. Invite your Sunday School to make baskets out of paper and use them to display the gift tags. Challenge your youth group to fundraise and purchase a whole hamper! Sell the tags before your service. When the congregation is invited to bring their harvest gifts to offer, the tags could be brought up too. 2 Think about other ways to use and display your Harvest hamper gift tags. Mount on card and use ribbon to display on tree branches. Fold in half and use cocktail sticks to make into flags. Use as cake toppers and have a cake sale. Don t forget to share your ideas and your celebrations with us at share@embraceme.org or via social media. If you would like to order collection boxes, Gift Aid envelopes or hard copies of our resources please contact us at info@embraceme.org or call 01494 897950. www.embraceme.org 1
HARVEST RESOURCES What makes an It s just a simple collection of items a few basic toiletries, a little pile of children s clothes and a small basket full of food to share out between them. But to Noura and her four children, it s the stuff of tears of thanksgiving and wide-eyed wonder. Their speechless delight is partly because it is all a gift a compassionate welcome from a local Christian seeking to share God s provision with them. But it is also because they have so little now that this ordinary offering has become an abundant feast. My kids haven t had such good food for a year now, says Noura. Before the war, Noura s young family lived in Raqqa in north-eastern Syria. Her husband worked as a labourer there, bringing in enough to support them all. But the war made things harder and harder for him until he became ill, then eventually died. Noura gathered up her children and fled the now Islamic State occupied area to seek hospitality in her mother s one room house in Safita (about five hours drive from home). Embrace supports local Christian organisations and churches across the Middle East as they bring healing and hope to refugees and internally displaced families like Noura s. This Harvest, as you celebrate and share all you have received and gathered in, could you consider making your thanksgiving even more abundantly generous by picturing families like Noura s around your table and by extending your feast to include them as well? This story can be read aloud as part of your Harvest service. We have also made it available as printable placemats for your Harvest supper and as an A5 article for you to use in your church newsletter. These can be found on the Harvest resource pages of our website. www.embraceme.org 2
HARVEST RESOURCES All-age talk idea You will need: two volunteers balloons and/or flowers a large table which you can set up at the front of church to face the congregation ten chairs two already at the table facing each other (and eight nearby) some food on a sharing plate some items from your Harvest food collection (if you are having one) or some other food items you have gathered a hamper containing some or all of the following milk, oil, rice, peanut butter, sugar, biscuits, lentils and baby milk (this represents a food parcel for a refugee) (optional) ten sets of place setting items (knives, forks, plates etc) as simple or as elaborate as you would like! (Before the service, set the table up with two chairs at one end facing each other and keep the other items accessible but out of sight.) Start by explaining that your Harvest celebration service is a party and by welcoming everyone to it. Explain that instead of celebrating a person, like a birthday party does, today you are celebrating all the amazing food that God gives us through what grows in the world he has made. Ask people to call out what a good party needs. Then explain how each is present in your celebration service: decorations (get help to blow up some balloons or put out some flowers on the table you have put out) music fun good food (put your sharing plate of party food on the table at this point) guests (invite your volunteers to come up and sit facing each other at the table, (optional) give them a place setting and invite them to start enjoying the feast on the sharing platter). www.embraceme.org 3
HARVEST RESOURCES Say that it looks like everything s ready now. But then, as if you are just remembering, say you think it might be a good idea to check in with the ultimate authority on parties, just to make sure nothing has been forgotten Take up your Bible and explain that God invented celebration and Jesus talked about parties too. Read out Luke 14:12-14 then say that it looks like your party needs to grow bigger! Add two more chairs to the table and (optional) two more place settings, then put some of the items from your Harvest collection or some symbolic food out on the table between them. If you have organised a Harvest collection of food items, talk about where they are going and how they will gather people into your feast. If you haven t planned a food collection, talk about some other ways your church is or could go about extending your to include those in need from your local community. Add the remaining six chairs to the table, three on each side facing each other and (optional) six more place settings, then put the hamper of goods that makes up the refugee food parcel, out on the table between them. Explain that it s not just people in our community that we can grow our to reach. Then tell Noura s family s story (see What makes an ) and explain that we can also give to Embrace so that many more families like Noura s in the Middle East can be included in our feast. If you want to encourage people to give to Embrace s work by purchasing virtual hamper items, refer to the Harvest hamper gift tags at this point (and talk about the cost of specific items in your example hamper). If you aren t using the Harvest hamper gift tags, simply talk in general about some of the different ways people can support Embrace s work with refugees in Finish by inviting people to pray about how they could keep growing their celebrations to include those outside the party (locally and globally) all year round. www.embraceme.org 4
HARVEST RESOURCES Prayers Set of three written prayers to be used at different points within the Harvest service Creator God and loving Father, we thank you for all you have given and all that is safely gathered in here today and all around the world; for harvested grain and ripe, juicy fruit, for tins and packets and all good, nutritious food. Creator God and loving Father, we thank you for everyone you have made and all who are safely gathered in homes and churches here today and all around the world; for old and young, boys and girls, for those we love and those we don t know. Creator God and loving Father, we thank you for giving to us so abundantly that we can help to safely gather in those who aren t yet enjoying a rich Harvest by generously sharing ours, as you always intended, with those who are hungry or have been forced to flee their homes. Amen Lord God, bless these gifts and bless all who receive them as they are given again. May they truly extend our Harvest celebrations to include the hungry and those who have had to flee their homes. And may they be used to build your kingdom of abundant, generous love. Lord God, bless us to be gifts too and to keep looking to receive only so that we can give again and again. May we continue sharing all we have with the hungry and those who have had to flee their homes. And may you use us to keep building your kingdom of abundant, generous love. Amen www.embraceme.org 5
HARVEST RESOURCES If you are using the all-age talk and the interactive elements it suggests in your service, you could add this extra, visually powerful element to these prayers: Ask three different people to lead the prayers one for each section/topic inviting each one in turn to come up to the front and sit down at the relevant part of your table, facing the congregation, whilst leading their section. Leader: Lord of the harvest, the party and the feast, thank you for creating such an amazing world for us to live in and enjoy. We pray for ourselves this Harvest and every day that we would always remember all good gifts come from you and live thankful, praise-filled and generous lives. Whenever we sit down to eat, whenever we buy food, whenever we are involved in sowing, nurturing or harvesting plants or crops and whenever we see or hear about someone who is hungry, stir up in us such grateful, loving hearts that we cannot help but worship you by sharing extravagantly with others the abundance that we only have because you gave it to us all in the first place. Lord of the harvest, the party and the feast, All: grow in us loving and generous hearts. Leader: Lord of the harvest, the party and the feast, thank you that you came to find us and invite us in and for your life-giving teaching that urges us to do the same for others. We pray for all those in our community this Harvest and every day who don t have enough to eat today or are worried about tomorrow s provision. Lord, in your mercy please soften hearts across our community and nation so that everyone on the margins is included. Help us to grow our celebrations and our every day generosity by opening up our homes and tables to others and emptying out the contents of our cupboards and bank accounts till everyone in need is gathered in and eating their fill. All: (You might like to pray for any specific local projects your church is supporting and/or sending its Harvest collection to at this point.) Lord of the harvest, the party and the feast, grow in us loving and generous hearts. Leader: Lord of the Harvest, the party and the feast, we grieve with you for places where there is no plentiful harvest to celebrate because fields and homes have been destroyed by war and people have had to flee the former rhythm and safety of their lives. We pray for Noura and her family, and for all Syrians like them, displaced within their country or searching for shelter beyond its borders. Please, Lord, meet their needs as you send your people out to gather them in. Thank you for the generosity of Middle Eastern Christians and churches. Inspire us by their example to release more resources to Embrace so they can enable many more refugee families like Noura s to receive hampers of hope this Harvest and beyond. Lord of the harvest, the party and the feast, All: grow in us loving and generous hearts. Amen www.embraceme.org 6
HARVEST HAMPERS Each label on this page represents essential supplies given to refugee families by our partners in All items are locally sourced to support the local economy. 15 per hamper* Cut out these labels and use them to raise funds to support our work with refugees or buy the whole sheet! Use them as cake toppers or mini gift tags, sell them as part of your Harvest or supper, and add them to any food items offered during your Harvest celebration. Why not share your fundraising ideas and pictures with us on Twitter or Facebook or email share@embraceme.org * If these items become fully funded we will use your donations to provide other essentials for refugees. PEANUT BUTTER DATE BISCUITS support refugees in support refugees in OIL 1.50 MILK 60p SUGAR 80p RICE 90p LENTILS 70p BABY MILK 1.50 1.00 SOAP 50p This donation will support refugees in 50p NAPPIES 5.00 This donation will support refugees in This donation will support refugees in TOOTHBRUSH & TOOTHPASTE 2.00
se o th er b em em r e as le p This Harvest me o h m o fr r fa d n a ed c la disp Buy a Harvest hamper gift today and bring healing and hope to refugees in www.embraceme.org/harvest
Colour in the beautiful mosaic.
Colour the bag of groceries. www.embraceme.org/harvest
www.embraceme.org/harvest Colour the supermarket shelves and be thankful for all we have.