Service Idea

A few weeks ago I mentioned an idea that uses a bean counter to reward your kids for a variety of behaviors. You can read about it HERE. When your bean counter is full, you are to reward - a personal reward and a service reward. I came across a terrific article in by Mary Jo Tate that outlines several ways you can serve single-parent families. I'd like to share a few of those that you can do as a family.

1. Pray - Pray for families that only have one parent at home. This is something that even very, small children can do. When you pray for these families regularly, you will be reminded of ways you can serve them in a physical way.
2. Money - Have a garage sale and donate the proceeds to a single-parent family. Unfortunately life insurance or child support often fall short of meeting basic needs. You may send want to use your church deacon's fund to make an anonymous gift to the family. Or, buy a gift card from a local store and send it in the mail.
3. Clean & Give - Clean out your kids' closets and donate toys, clothes or other items to these families
4. Time - Offer free babysitting so a single parent can run to the store by her/himself. Offer to clean their home. If your own kids have learned to clean, then you can go over as a family and help them out. Of course, you don't want your own kids to spend more time playing than cleaning.
   
5. Hospitality - Have a family over for a meal. What a blessing it would be for a single-parent to get a free night without cooking or cleaning.

Any other ideas for ministering to single-parent families? Remember that the Core Phase of Leadership Education is the place to start building a foundation of character in our kids. Start when they are young and service will be a habit when they are older.

FWIW, Mary Jo Tate is a fellow-blogger. Check out her blog at www.homeschoolblogger.com/Entrepreneurs

Kerry

Ideas in this post came from "How You Can Help A Single-Parent Family" in Family Reformation, Winter 2004.