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Island churchgoers given hundreds of pounds of flour, decide to bake 1,300 cookies

Ladysmith’s Oceanview Community Church comes up with ‘Milk and Cookie Day’ idea for students
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Volunteers from the Oceanview Community Church hand out cookies to students and staff in the Ladysmith Secondary School foyer. (Photo submitted)

BY DUCK PATERSON

As Ladysmith Secondary School’s principal Dave Travers put it, “milk and cookies are not just for little kids – big kids love them as well.”

Members of the Oceanview Community Church showed up at the school Nov. 18 with more than 1,300 home-baked cookies.

The project came out of phone call to Darrin Phillips, the pastor of Oceanview Community Church, from Living Edge Markets, a food bank operated out of five different churches, in Victoria. The food bank had received a donation of nine 50-pound sacks of flour which it wasn’t able to use.

“That is a very difficult item to give out at a food bank as most folks are using a microwave or hotplate in a tiny rental if they can afford it, or are couch surfing with friends, therefore having not access to an oven for baking,” Phillips said. “The organizers called us and asked if we could use 300 pounds of flour? We said, ‘we don’t have anything on the go at the moment, but I’m sure the Lord will open up an opportunity.’”

The church decided to approach Ladysmith intermediate and secondary schools with the idea of having a ‘Milk and Cookie Day’ and the principals of both schools jumped at the idea.

The next step was sourcing the milk, and Peter Richmond of the 49th Parallel Grocery and his staff arranged through Dairyland for a donation of 775 cartons. The balance of the cookie ingredients, such as sugar, butter, chocolate chips, etc., were supplied by Oceanview Church.

The intermediate school was planning a ‘Respect Week’ and principal Laura King thought the milk and cookie day would be a great tie-in. Once the students received their treats they were directed to a table covered in yellow newsprint where they could write down what ‘respect’ meant to them.

“It was a gorgeous sunny day and seeing the long line of 315 kids excitedly waiting was fantastic,” Phillips said.

About 45 church members, including youths, participated in the cookie-making spree.

“I’ve always thought of making cookies as a lazy Saturday afternoon thing to do when it’s raining outside, but when you have to make over 1,200 cookies it is some serious work,” the pastor said.

The group baked chocolate chip cookies, gluten-free monster cookies and snickerdoodles, which the church’s Brazilian youth pastor mis-heard “and happily referred to them as ‘snickernoodles’ all week,” said Phillips.

The pastor said church members didn’t announce themselves as representing the church, hand out literature or talk about their faith.

“We were simply there to be a pipeline for God’s blessings. The Lord blessed us with resources and we in turn give those with an open hand to our community,” Phillips said.



editor@nanaimobulletin.com

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