Last [month] I backed a truck up to a house where a woman had been a widow for three weeks. Freezer paper packages of venison, a couple bags of groceries, and a load of firewood off the trailer. She kept saying she was fine. Her hands were shaking on the storm door. We stacked the wood, told her we would be back, and meant it.
Who this is for
Widows. Single mothers. A few grandparents raising grandkids because the middle generation could not. These are not helpless people. Most are running a household on their own and doing it well. What they are short on is margin, and one bad week, a transmission, a medical bill, a dead furnace, can take a family that is holding on and put it underwater.
Visit means show up
James says the pure kind of religion is to “visit orphans and widows in their affliction” (James 1:27). Visit is the word that matters. It does not say send a check and feel good about it. It says go, sit down, learn the name, come back. The fund pays for things, but the point is the showing up. A check with nobody attached to it is just a check.
What the fund does
We keep it simple. Venison from our own freezers and from hunters who donate an animal. Groceries when the month runs long. A utility bill or a car repair when that is the one thing standing between a family and a real problem. A phone number that gets answered. Families get connected through [local churches and a couple of pastors who know who is hurting].
What we have seen
We have seen a widow get through her first winter without dreading the mailbox. We have seen kids who had gone quiet start talking again once the house felt steady. We are not a foundation and we cannot fix a hard life. We can take three or four things off a family’s plate in a season, and sometimes that is enough for them to catch their breath.
How to help
Hunters can donate an animal in the fall and we handle the processing. Anyone can give toward groceries and bills, and every dollar goes to a family, not to overhead. And if you know a widow or a single mom who is one bad week from trouble, tell us. That is usually how we find them.