Springwell Church in Taylors, is reaching out to the Greenville homeless community one family at a time. Through the Greenville Area Interfaith Hospitality Network (GAIHN) project, Springwell has renovated a secured house in Greenville, and has moved a family in that house to live for a period of nine to 12 months.
Volunteers make repairs and renovations on a house for the GAIHN project.During that time period, the family is working and saving money in order to purchase their own house and car.
“Several months ago we had a dream; a dream that was really about bringing churches together. And the dream was to bring churches together to do what we can’t do apart,” said Scott McAlister, pastor of Springwell Church.
McAlister got an idea of showing love with no strings attached through a series a church in Oklahoma called One Prayer.
“As we listened to his series about One Prayer, we tried to make it our own, to make it uniquely Springwell,” McAlister said. “And we began to ask other churches if they would be willing to participate. To participate, but then to come together for one project. That one project was to be a part of a transitional house.”
For several years, Springwell has been partnering with 13 other churches and opening their facilities to the homeless of Greenville County. Four times a year, families come and stay at the church for one week. The families are given food and shelter for the week long stay.
“During the day they find a job; they secure a job, and then they’re ready for phase two through the GAIHN organization,” said McAlister.
Within the past year, the church has taken on the second phase of that project, transitional housing. Along with Springwell, local churches such as Freedom Fellowship, Marathon North and Cornerstone have contributed through volunteering and donating money to the cause. Through these churches, more than 200 people have volunteered.
“We talked to those pastors to help renovate a house, and to pull our resources together to be able to take a homeless family, who’d already gone through phase one of the GAIHN process, and to give them a safe, secure place to be,” McAlister said.
Over the past several months, volunteers – carpenters, skilled laborers and those who had no experience – would meet on Saturdays and work in four hour shifts. The house has been completed and the family moved in on Sept. 27.
The congregation had the chance to meet the mother and her two children on Sunday, Oct. 5. She told about becoming homeless after getting away from an abusive marriage.
“We walked away from everything, material things, everything. We just left,” she said. “(Through GAIHN) we were presented with an opportunity to stand back up again and keep going.”
McAlister’s challenge for next year is to renovate another house and be able to allow another homeless family a place to live while they try to get back on their feet.
“If this was just a one time project so that we could pat ourselves on the back one Sunday morning and be proud and leave and think ‘Man we’re good people aren’t we?’ If that’s the reason we did it, then we did it for the wrong motivation,'” said McAlister.
Springwell has plans to continue to get in touch with and partner with other churches to help show love with no strings attached.
“You have to learn to love people with no strings attached. You don’t ask anything in return, but simply out of the overflow of the heart we just love other people,” McAlister said.