Our Angel Tree Programs focus on the children in our community that need a little extra help. These programs are especially great for families with children. Kids can learn to love giving as much as they love getting!

Christmas Angel Trees

Each Christmas our Mission Commission sponsors two Angel Tree programs. The first is for the 3 and 4 year olds in the Mother's Day Out program at Montopolis Friendship Community Center. This center formed as a United Methodist Women's effort to promote community programs in the Montopolis neighborhood with special emphasis on women and children. The second is with the Salvation Army Angel Tree program which provides new toys and clothes to over 6000 children (12 and under from qualifying families) in the Austin area each December. Last year we supported over 70 Angels!

How You Can Help

This is a wonderful time for the whole family to share the gift of God's love with those less fortunate. Christmas trees will be located in the Narthex and hung with angels. Members and visitors choose an angel and make a child's Christmas a little brighter. When you see the trees, come quickly, our Angels go fast! Donation envelopes for the Holiday Meal Fund are also available which will help provide holiday meals to those in need.

Easter Angel Tree and the Pajama Program

At Easter time we give the kids at the Montopolis Friendship Center Mother's Day Out program an Easter basket filled with a small stuffed bunny, candies and an Easter story book. In addition to the Easter baskets, we also participate in the Pajama Program. This program provides a new pair of pajamas and a book to children who are taken to shelters in the Austin area. The Pajama Program's hope is that these children will feel a bit more loved and comforted as they lie down to sleep at night in a strange place. Last year we collected enough to give new pj's and books to 27 kids! We collect money for the baskets and you can chose to shop for pajamas and books or donate money for the items to be purchased.

Contact: Sandee Setterquist at 512-291-8849 for more information about any of these programs.

If you can't do a mission trip, then why not be a volunteer during the Family Promise/IHN host week right here at our church!  Families in this program have recently become homeless and are in crisis.   These families find safe and friendly support from their church hosts. 

MUMC has participated in this program for over 15 years giving these families an environment where they can maintain their dignity in difficult times.  We are always in need of more volunteers.   It takes many church members to make the week a success.  No special skills are required.  We need folks to provide meals, set up and breakdown rooms, spend a few hours visiting with the families, sleep overnight at the church, drive the families to the day center, pray for the families and to help with the laundry after the families leave.  Pick how you would like to serve.  Supporting this wonderful ministry is a way to live out your faith. 

Future Host Weeks

You can make a difference in the lives of these families! 

For more information on how to get involved email Linda Voges at llvoges@aol.com 

For more information about the IHN program in Austin, visit their web site at www.foundationforthehomeless.org

Over 58,000 hard-working, low-income Austinites live in substandard or overcrowded housing. Monthly rent often exceeds a family's monthly household income. Bills are juggled from one month to the next, families go without necessities and communities deteriorate into squalor when there is no hope of a better tomorrow.

Habitat For Humanity  gives families that hope of achieving their dreams of a place to call home. In 22 years of building homes in partnership with low-income families, Austin Habitat volunteers have created over 200 affordable new houses for people in need.

Each year Manchaca United Methodist Church joins with other Methodist congregations in the area to help build a home for a needy family here in Austin. It is a chance for us to “get our hands dirty” reaching out to help others in the community. It is a wonderful source of Peace to know that you are acting as the hands and feet of Christ to help someone who really needs it.

This is definitely one of the four United Methodist focus areas: “Engaging in ministry with the poor.” It is a good opportunity for a “face-to-face” ministry because the family is always on site. This is not a “handout”; it is a “hand up”. Once the families are determined to be eligible for the program (by being identified as living in conditions that you and I would deem unacceptable), they provide “sweat equity” by helping to build houses for others; they attend 24 classroom hours to learn how to handle their money and maintain their house; they have to pay back the loan for all of the materials that went into the house; and then the “hand up” is the labor provided by you and I.

There could have been another verse added to Matthew Chapter 25: “Lord, when did we see you living in poverty and help to build you a house? And the King will answer, when you did it for the least of these, you did it for me."

Are there any requirements for participation?

All volunteers are required to complete the Austin Habitat for Humanity online orientation and bring a signed waiver, which can be downloaded from this site, to the work site with them. On-site training will be provided, so no skills are necessary to participate.

How can I participate in the next United Methodist Build?

The next Methodist Build will be a winter/spring 2011 effort. We will need to have a fundraiser with a goal of collecting $6,500. You do not need any skills; just a willingness to help. If you are interested in helping in any way, please contact Ron Hawkins at 512-280-4956 (home) or 512-924-8692 (cell). Give Ron a call and come be a part of this very special ministry: Habitat for Humanity.