Early in the new year, FMC was contacted by the locally-based charity Shelterbox to ask if we would be one of a group of churches piloting their new initiative ‘Give a Tent for Lent’. The Leadership Team considered it and thought it would be worthwhile. The challenge of raising enough money to provide for a tent (£317) seemed within reach. The slogan ‘a tent for Lent’ seemed to have a good ring to it, and it made a change from giving something up (like chocolate!) for the 40 days before Easter.

To help the initiative, Shelterbox loaned us a tent for two Sundays, and provided a speaker for lunchtime on our Church Anniversary Sunday. This coincided with the news of the terrible cyclone and flooding that hit Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe. The response of the congregation was amazing. Before we had even put up the ‘tentometer’ we had already received more than the cost of one tent. The target was raised to provide two tents. However, the generosity of the people FMC continued to flow, and by Easter we were able to send sufficient money (including the Gift Aid) for three tents! 

It has been heartwarming to see the generous love of the people of FMC responding to such a clear need in a practical way. It has also been a privilege to be part of the pilot project, and to be able to feed back to Shelterbox some of our observations.