Skip to serve

Christine Carrillo

Hundreds of devoted church goers played hookie from church services

Sunday to serve the community.

What began as a scheduling problem between the ROCKo7 harbof7 r

Church and the Costa Mesa Senior Center has turned into an important

community event.

Sunday marked the 3rd annual Serve Day, which began when the ROCKo7

harbof7 r Church, which holds Sunday services at the senior center, was

unable to hold their services there three years ago and instead decided

to go out and serve the community.

“So often people think of church as being within four walls,” said

David Trotter, pastor of communications and church events. “We feel

strongly that we need to go out to the community and serve others with no

other agenda.”

After witnessing the impact, the first serve day made in the

community, the church decided to cancel their regular services, once a

year and instead, devote their time to the community.

ROCKo7 harbof7 r is now joined on Serve Day by other churches,

businesses and nonprofit organizations.

More than 1,000 people participated in the day by serving meals,

conducting cleanups, holding picnics and games and simply spending time

with people at more than 25 different nonprofit centers, neighborhoods

and community service locations throughout Orange County.

Believing that one of the key purposes of a church is to care for the

needs within its community, ROCKo7 harbof7 r arranged for three

different Serve Day locations.

“At every location I saw people using their gifts to serve -- trying

to be God’s hands and feet,” Trotter said.

One of those locations was The Lighthouse in Costa Mesa Church of the

Nazarene.

Nearly 40 volunteers helped with patchwork around the church --

painting in hallways and classrooms and planting of a tree and flowers to

add to the landscape. However, one of the most significant services they

provided was building a ramp to make the church more wheelchair

accessible.

“I love what the effect has been,” said Daniel Machado, a spokesman

for The Lighthouse. “It’s awesome to see two churches of two different

denominations work together to do the same thing.”

Serve Day has gained support over these first couple of years and now

has 30 churches, businesses and nonprofit organizations collaborating.

“The thing that is the most powerful is their hearts,” Trotter said of

the volunteers. “Their hearts are to serve others and they end up walking

away having experienced something that changed their life.”