Then the King will say, ‘I’m telling the solemn truth: Whenever you did one of these things to someone overlooked or ignored, that was me—you did it to me.’
~Matthew 25:verse40
Who we are:
We are a fledgling non-profit attempting to leverage social media for meeting real social justice needs – based on Matthew 25:verse40.
What we do:
We partner with social workers (at hospitals or other institutions) and churches. The social workers know of a great many needs; churches are made up of people willing (and often able) to help. Verse40 provides a system by which known needs are communicated to people willing to help.
We know that there are a great many people, overlooked or ignored, who would greatly benefit from simple help; a ride to the doctor, a baby sitter for a few hours, etc. We also know that there are a great many people who would be most happy to help, if only they knew…
But there is a communication gap.
The primary medium we use to connect people is via social workers at hospitals and social networking (Twitter). For more information about how to get involved and how to use Twitter to get involved with verse40 see our How To Twitter and How To verse40 pages.
Why we do what we do:
First of all is our conviction that the Christian faith is to be active, helping the marginalized, overlooked, and ignored people of the world. The problem is, by definition, such people are often overlooked. Verse40 will help some of these ignored or overlooked people get noticed and served.
Have you ever seen someone begging at a freeway on ramp and thought, “sure…that’s probably just someone looking for a handout – they probably don’t even need it” or some such thing? Well, through verse40 genuine needs come to light. Volunteers can serve through verse40 knowing that these needs are actual. We make real needs known.
I know many churches who wish to impact their communities, but don’t know how. Verse40 provides a way for any community of faith to put feet to their faith.
A short story of our beginnings:
I was at church one day and a friend, who works at a downtown hospital, came to me with an issue. She told me about a young woman whose medical care was complicated by the fact that she needed a ride to the hospital. That’s it, just a ride. She said that she imagined that many people in the church would have been willing to help this woman, but that there was no way for them to know. I told her that I would have given her a ride, but I, the person with the keys, didn’t know about her, the person needing a ride! My friend said that these kinds of situations come up all the time at the hospital and she suggested we find a way to bridge this communication gap, mobilizing the church for service. Thus, verse40 was born.
