Ministry Report - March - June, 2008

After a very slow winter, we have started our summer street outreach, and are out now until Mid October.

From March - June 9, we have:

Served 269 hot meals;
Served 320 lunches;
Given out 544 bags of groceries;
Given out 234 $5 McDonald's gift Certificates;
Given out 136 $10 Quizno Gift Certificates;
Given out 317 Bibles;
Had 130 personal meetings with people to share Christ with.

Our summer outreach has just begun, we are looking for a good year of ministry to our streets. We are seeing incredible needs, with gas prices at an all time high, and price of food and just about everything else rising, people are suffering.

We are turning away more people than we are helping, this is a first for us.

Right now, we are totally out of both McDonald's Gift Certificates and Quizno's Gift Cards, and our hunger fund budget is at Zero.

But we have a good supply of Bibles, and we will do our best to spend as much time as we can on the streets, sharing Christ with all who will listen.

I want to thank everyone for prayers concerning my wife's mother, she is still in the nursing home, but she will not survive very much longer. It was a very hard to pre-plan a funeral, but she has lived a very long life, just turning 97 on May 1.

So keep us in prayer as we cope with a death coming soon. Keep the Burlington Street Ministry Team in prayer as we try to minister to a tough mission field.

Your Missionary to the Streets,

Dave

Ministry Report for January - March, 2008

This has been the slowest, non eventful winter we have ever seen! Our big question this winter is, where is every one?

The streets have been quite, not much to report, most Friday nights, it is just staff at our Bible Study, which has never happened before.


But the bulk of our ministry this winter has taken place at the Nothgate Housing Project, we have been ministering to quite a few people there over the winter, provided food, and other items to some very needy folks. We have a Tuesday Evening Bible Study, and Sunday Worship there in Northgate.

So far this year, From January - March 14th, we:

Gave out 515 Bags of Groceries
Gave out 315 $5 McDonald's Gift Cards
Gave out 121 $5 Quizno Gift Cards
Gave out 68 Bibles
Met with 41 people to share Christ with them, and to encourage them.

We begin our outdoor ministry to the streets on Friday, May 23rd, and would like to invite anyone who would be willing to come down that Friday Evening and spend two hours in prayer for the summer ministry on the streets.

We praise God that we have already raised all of the $5000 we need for this summer!!! This too is a miracle, as we are usually scrambling to raise money to buy bibles! Thanks to a generous gift by Community Bible Church is January, we were able to get most of what we needed!

Our only real need we will have is Quizno gift Certificates. We need Quite a few loaded with $10. Since McDonald's has moved out of downtown, the Quizno's has
taken it's place as the best place for us to give out certificates for food.

So if you could help us with these, this would be a very big help to us. We also still need McDonald's Gift Certificates, as we use these also.


A special thanks to Patricia Worley and her "Tiny Tots" Sunday School Class from
the Crestview Baptist Church in North Carolina, this class of little children has been sending us an average of $200 worth of McDonald's gift Certificates each month for well over a year, possible even two years. They have done so much for us, and blessed so many of the struggling hurting folks we minister to so much, and has allowed us to be able to touch some families we would not been able to if not for these certificates.

My health has improved, I have fully recovered from the heart issue I had in November, and back to full schedule, but am taking care of myself better than I had, and taking more time for rest and enjoyment.

We are looking forward to a great year of Ministry to the Streets!

Thank you all for your love and support.

Your Missionary to the Streets,

Dave

Winter Ministry and the Holiday Seasons

We are now in winter mode, meeting each Friday Evening at the food court in the Town
Center Mall right Downtown. We had a great summer, but most of the folks we have
ministered to have left, so we are down to a few individuals who are brave enough to stay over the winter!

We are gearing up for a couple of major outreaches for the Thanksgiving and Christmas
season. We will help provide food for 34 families for Thanksgiving, and we will help 56 families for Christmas as well as our annual Christmas on the Street outreach for the homeless.

We will again be reaching out to needy families at the Northgate Apartments, a 336
apartment complex, the largest in Vermont, half of these are extremely low income and in great need, among them are 400 children.

Now for some of our needs:

McDonald's Downtown has closed down, so the homeless cannot use the McDonald's gift
Certificates unless they can get out to one of the others. However there is a Quizno's right downtown, and gift cards are available. We could use about 300 gift cards from Quizno's in $5.00 per card. These will be given to the homeless downtown.

We do still need McDonald's gift Certificates for our needy families, so we are still
giving these out and are very important to our ministry.

We do need Postage Stamps, books of 20 to be given out to the homeless. We do not need any batteries this year, someone has provided all we need for this year.


Our biggest need this year will be cash. We are desperately low, and do not have enough to get us by the winter, and we are very concerned about the needs of so many people this winter. We will need to raise about $4000 in the next two months.

We do not do fundraisers, none of us are skilled in that area, so we rely on those who believe in what we do. A one time gift to help us for the Thanksgiving and Christmas Season will be a blessing to many needy folk.

Pray for us as we come to the end of 2007, and end another year of ministry to the
streets. 2008 will mark 33 years of continuous ministry to the streets of Burlington.
Thank you all for your support over these many years.

We look forward to 2008.

In His Love,

Dave

Ministry Report for May - August, 2007

We are having a great summer so far, with many opportunities to share Christ with those on the street. Every Friday, our team is downtown Burlington, meeting people, meeting felt needs and sharing Christ with all who will listen. Building relationships is our main tool for this task of evangelizing the streets.

What we have accomplished since May;

Given out 702 Bibles.

Given out 300 $5 books of McDonald's Gift Certificates to needy individuals.

Served 322 hot meals.

Provided 477 bags of groceries to needy families.

Had 149 personal meetings with interested individuals.

Had 5 people receive Christ, and baptized all 5 of them, after some time of study and preparation.

We will continue our outdoor ministry until mid October then we will move inside for winter.

We wish to thank all of you who financially supported us over the summer, it is with your help that we have been able to accomplish what we have. Right now, we are in need of about $500 to see us through until fall, and we can still use some McDonald's Gift Certificates.

After 32 years on the streets, I sometimes think I have seen it all, but every so often, God does something truly amazing that just touches your heart in an incredible way. Last Friday, a man in a wheel chair came up to our booth, and he could not talk, nor speak English having throat cancer, so he motioned to us for something to write on. We gave him a pad, and he asked for a Spanish Bible, which we just happened to have just one copy. When we gave it to him, the man held it to his heart and cried, and was so thankful for that bible. What are the chances of someone who spoke no English, looking for a Spanish Bible on the streets of Burlington, Vermont? If this was not a "divine appointment" I don't know what else it was.

Again, thank you all for your support and prayers, and if you can help us at all over this small hurdle, we would be most grateful.

Your missionary to the Streets,

Dave

Ministry Report, January 1 - May, 2007

It has been a long winter, we actually seen fewer people over this past winter than we normally do, partly I think because of the weather.

Since January 1, We have:

Given out 790 Bags of Groceries to needy families

Given out 1,418 $5 McDonald's Gift Certificates to the homeless and needy families.

Given out 247 bibles,

Had personal meetings with 157 different individuals, and seen one man profess faith in Christ.

Conducted weekly bible studies downtown.

We begin our Summer outdoor Street Outreach on Friday, May 25th, with our Bible Booth and street teams.We are still short of our financial goal by $750, and we are still in need of 11 packs of Energizer AA Lithium batteries and are running short of McDonald's gift Certificates both we need to make contact with some new homeless individuals. If your fellowship or church group is looking for a short term project, this would be a good one.

Please pray for us as we begin our 33rd year of summer outreach to our streets. Since I began this work in 1974, I am amazed at what God has done during this time on our streets, and continue to look for the great things He will do this year.

Your Missionary to the Streets,

Dave

Spring is in the air!

Spring is in the air, and for us that means we are looking to get out on the street again. Winter has been tough, not much happening since Christmas, but now that the weather is warming up, the streets are coming alive.

Our start date for our Summer Outreach is Friday, May 25th. One thing we are going to do is to make contact with some of the more elusive homeless, some of them are new, some have been around for a bit.

If anyone is looking for a small project for a youth group or Sunday School Class, we need to collect 25 packs of Energizer e Lithium AA batteries so we can put together a package to give to these homeless folks. There will be the batteries, McDonald's Gift Certificates, hygiene supplies and a pocket New Testament.

We want the Energizer e lithium batteries because they last 7 times longer than ordinary alkaline batteries. So if anyone can help us with these, this will help us greatly. We need to purchase Bibles, so if we do not have to buy the batteries also, that will be a big help. Also we need $1100 to help with bibles, permits, etc.

We would also like to do a few 24 hour prayer vigils this year, we use to do them, but the last few years, have not been able to get the number of people to cover the 24 hour time. I am hoping for a few groups to come up to help us this year, hopefully we will get some serious prayer cover.

We had a great outreach last Summer, looking for an even better one this year!

Christmas Outreach

On Friday, December 22 we set out in the pouring rain to bring Christmas gifts to the homeless. Each package contained $20 of McDonald's gift Certificates, 6 brand new pairs of socks, a pack of AA Batteries, one book of 20 stamps, and a pocket New Testament. We gave out 65 of these to very grateful folks.

One group of homeless folks in a camp behind K-mart asked me to read the Christmas story to them from Luke, so I read them the story, and one man with a guitar began to sing Silent Night, and 9 homeless men, 2 woman and myself sang. I was able to witness to most of these folks of the incredible love that God has for us as He came down to dwell with men, to actually become human and live with us, and ultimately die to secure our salvation.

We also provided McDonald's gift Certificates, food, and money to the Northgate Residence Association so needs could be met to buy presents for poor children of the Northgate Community and provide for needy families here who lacked this Christmas.

I want to thank everyone who donated McDonald's gift certificates, batteries and cash to make our Christmas Outreach such a wonderful success this year.

It is always so incredible to me when I am on the street to always see some of the people so needy and so hurting, and also quite a bit of faith. We have become a source of fellowship for so many of the folks we know from the street. They have become like family to us.

Please pray with us this coming new year that we will be effective on the streets for Jesus in 2007. Pray for our finances, and pray for me as I am experiencing some health issues, one of which is affecting my ability to walk without pain.I am so blessed to have been able to minister for 33 years on our Streets. I look forward to 2007!