How To Say Thanks?

Dear SOS Family, 

We pray this finds you well!

In this season of Thanksgiving, you’re close in our hearts though it’s been so long that we’ve shared time and space with many of you. Dear joys coupled with sorrows.

We hold both, just like we hold the brokenheartedness in living in a world so far from the fullness we were created to experience while holding hope in God’s goodness, that the work of redemption spreads wider each day, and that one day all creation will experience the shalom we long for.

We’re here to send you our love, to encourage you, and to share stories of God’s faithfulness and kindness to SOS in the last year. We’ve never been without stories to tell of God’s faithfulness, but they’ve really seemed to stack up this year. Here are a few that feel especially dear to us:

  • SOS Builds has finally celebrated a Builder’s high school graduation! Martavius has been a part of SOS Builds since 2015 when he was a 7th grader at Lester Prep and SOS Builds was in year #2 of programming.

    He graduated from Kingsbury High School in May, worked on our SOS Staff Team this summer, and was promptly hired as a Carpenter’s Assistant at a Memphis-based construction company where he continues to work.

    Martavius has been one of the firsts of so many elements of SOS Builds. We’re thankful for him, encouraged by him, and so hopeful that the trail he blazed with be a path for others to follow.

  • SOS Builds is back in action and meeting with high school Builders on Tuesdays and Thursdays. There were a few beautiful November afternoons where we stepped back and savored what we were witness to:

    -half of the team working outside of the SOS shop and independently creating and assembling SOS Builds’ now-iconic picnic tables.

    -half of the team across the street at IBERIA Bank setting up bank accounts with which to participate in SOS Builds’ matched IDA savings programs.

    We love these Builders dearly and so enjoy watching them grow emotionally, spiritually, in their skill...and in their stature! No one is taller than Big Dog quite yet, but they’re eye to eye or better with the rest of us!

    Additionally, SOS Builds was a featured guest at the Carpenter Art Garden and led Lester Middle School students in making picture frames on Wednesday afternoons. We love our unique intersection of kiddos and power tools!

  • The SOS Academy is back in action! The three Academy residents, new Memphians all, live in the SOS Princeton House in West Binghampton. Two work with World Relief, one with Oasis of Hope. They’re being coached in Biblical literacy, spiritual practices, and community development.

    We celebrate their hearts and hope, their willingness to learn, to be present, and to invest in neighbors and the city we love for the glory of our King.

    They are building practices and rhythms as invested and empathetic Kingdom Citizens and we thank God.

  • Summer Camp spots at SOS sold out in minutes on registration day in October!

    This one still gets us. What incredible favor to receive such a response any year, but especially after two summers without camps.

    We are so loved by so many who will again bring their youth to our doors next summer in anticipation that they will experience the power of the Gospel and the life-changing goodness of King Jesus in new ways.

    We can hardly wait.

  • As 2021 wraps up, we are so thankful to be able to report the 21 full roof replacements that SOS worked to provide in Binghampton, The Heights, and Orange Mound.

    Though our playbook has drastically changed since our last summer camps in 2019, we praise God for the contractors, grants, volunteers, staff, donated supplies, and financial gifts that were provided to us to further our vision of caring for our neighbors and working together to make homes warmer, safer and drier.

    We believe this work honors our King and the call to care sacrificially for our neighbors and to work to reconcile what has been broken whether roof and rafters or relationships.

We share so that you too may praise God for the ways that the good, good Kingdom is growing ever wider and truer here in our hearts and city. 

And to thank you.

You hold us up and spur us on by your prayers, your time, your dollars, and your care.

We know we don’t labor alone in this work that we love. What a thought to imagine how especially great and many the cloud of witnesses that cheers on the work of SOS.

Please consider a one-time or recurring financial gift to SOS.

Whether inspired by Thanksgiving, Giving Tuesday, Christmas, or End of Year Giving, your generosity will further our efforts and, we pray, further the results that fill us with thankfulness and wonder at the workings of God in Binghampton, The Heights, and Orange Mound.

Your gift of any amount ($5, $50, $500, or more!) matters and will be stewarded with excellence and thanksgiving.

With love and hope and thankful hearts and deep care,

The SOS Staff Family

Philip, Big Dog, Kelly, Ally, Jake, Mark, Kayci & Bree

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