05/28/2026
Your Compassion Is Changing Lives
When we watch the evening news or scroll through headlines online, we are reminded that our world continues to experience enormous pain. Wildfires destroy communities. Floods wash away homes. Wars force families to flee. Storms, disease outbreaks, and economic hardship affect millions of people every year.
Some disasters make national headlines. Many others never do.
Yet in every place where suffering appears, God’s people are called to respond with compassion, hope, and practical care.
That is the mission of One Great Hour of Sharing.
Through the generosity of churches and individuals across the American Baptist family, lives were touched in remarkable ways throughout 2025. Your gifts provided emergency relief, supported displaced families, strengthened churches, and funded long-term development ministries around the world and here in the United States.
Because of your support, American Baptists were able to respond quickly when disaster struck in places such as Burma (Myanmar), Nepal, Vietnam, South Africa, Cuba, Jamaica, Indonesia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Relief efforts provided food, shelter, medical support, rebuilding assistance, refugee care, and recovery ministry to families facing unimaginable hardship.
Closer to home, One Great Hour of Sharing grants supported wildfire recovery efforts in California, tornado and storm relief in Illinois and Iowa, church fire recovery in Oklahoma, flood assistance in West Virginia, and emergency support for immigrant and asylum-seeking families here in Massachusetts.
But the ministry did not stop with emergency relief.
One Great Hour of Sharing also invested in long-term development projects that help communities build stronger and more hopeful futures. Around the world, grants supported women’s education, refugee ministries, children with learning differences, livelihood programs, water projects, after-school ministries, migrant centers, and outreach to vulnerable communities.
Here in the United States, ministries were strengthened through food and shelter programs, refugee and immigration assistance, ESL programs, youth outreach, and housing support for at-risk young people.
These ministries remind us that Christian compassion is not only about responding to tragedy. It is also about helping people rebuild their lives with dignity, opportunity, and hope.
As followers of Christ, we are called to see beyond our own communities and recognize that we belong to a global family. The Apostle Paul reminds us that when one part of the body suffers, all suffer together. One Great Hour of Sharing gives us a meaningful way to live out that calling.
Every gift matters.
A single offering may provide emergency food after a disaster. It may help repair a damaged church building. It may support a refugee family beginning a new life. It may provide clean water, educational resources, or shelter to someone who otherwise would go without.
Most importantly, these gifts become a testimony of Christ’s love in a hurting world.
As our congregation participates in the One Great Hour of Sharing offering this year, let us remember that our generosity reaches far beyond what we can see. Together, we become partners in healing, restoration, and hope.
Thank you for continuing to support this vital ministry through your prayers, compassion, and faithful giving.
“Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” — Galatians 6:2
Please consider what support you can offer to this vital ministry.
Outreach Team
