Volunteers Susan Earle (left) and Verna Brown serve at the 70th annual Grape Harvest
Festival in Rancho Cucamonga, California. Click to enlarge.
By Neil Earle
For the fourth year in a row, the New Covenant Fellowship of Glendora, California, sponsored a literature table October 2-4 at the 70th annual Rancho Cucamonga Grape Harvest Festival in Rancho Cucamonga. The results were encouraging, even with cold windy weather and a stiff recession.
Rancho Cucamonga was one of the earliest wine-growing regions in Southern California, and the Glendora church planted a Sunday church in this vibrant area in March 2005. We've moved around as a congregation quite a bit since then, but the chance to interact with the community and get to know our neighbors in this lively area is hard to resist.
At the Festival, the Glendora church gives away free literature, mostly published by GCIs Office of Reconciliation Ministries. This includes the Reconcile newsletter, the ORM video, the award-winning DVD "A Time To Reconcile" and other relevant literature. This year New Covenant Fellowship partnered with the Cops and Clergy Network of the Inland Empire, a caring agency for young people up against the drugs and gang threat in the Inland Empire, some of whose 500 gangs are controlled by drug lords in Mexico.
The team distributed almost 100 pieces of literature and media updates, including material given to the Mayor of Rancho Cucamonga and the head of the local Chamber of Commerce.
Meanwhile, the same weekend, a team of Glendora assistant pastors performed a baptism near the home of Elder Miles Johnson, whose neighbor had become a GCI member through Miles good neighboring efforts over the years. A lady staying with his neighbor witnessed the baptism and asked to be counseled herself. I guess that shows everything can be an evangelistic opportunity, said Assistant Pastor Emmett Rushing, who performed the ceremony.