The Souper Bowl Challenge

The results are in for our Souper Bowl of Caring Challenge! There is good news and bad news.

First, if you don't know what this is all about, let me give you some background. The Souper Bowl of Caring is a national project that involves youth groups across the country raising money to fight hunger. We all like to eat big on Super Bowl Sunday, so the Souper Bowl of Caring encourages us to give big to help those who don't have food.

Things were especially exciting for us this year because the Bears were in the big game. To make things even more interesting, we were challenged by Second Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis to see who can raise the most money for the Souper Bowl.

Just like the underdog Bears, we had our work cut out for us. We orginally set our goal for this year at $4000, which I thought was pretty good. After learning that Second Pres typically raises about $10,000 a year for the Souper Bowl, we upped our goal to $10,000 as well.

The competition captured the imagination of the congregation and got everyone excited. The Lt. Governor of Illinois, Pat Quinn, was also excited and joined our cause. Lt. Governor Quinn is a big supporter of the Souper Bowl and invited me to speak at his press conference about our competition with Indianapolis.

On Super Bowl Sunday, we had dozens of Junior and Senior High youth all over the church raising money and collecting cans. It was an exciting morning...much more exciting, it turns out, than the game itself!

So, here's the good news: Both churches collected more for hunger than they ever have before. Here at Fourth Church, our total this year was over three times our best total from years past. I was truly amazed at how much we were able to raise this year.

When all was said and done, we collected $13,383 in cash and food donations. This is absolutely incredible!

Big thanks to all of you who helped collect and to all of you who made donations. The people who benefit from the food programs at the Elam Davies Social Service Center will truly be blessed by this work.

Now for the bad news. Unfortunately, we didn't fare much better in our competition than the Bears did. Second Presbyterian in Indianapolis raised $25,739 in cash and food donations. With the help of publicity from the fact that a certain Colts quarterback is a member of their congregation, they were able to be the #1 church in the nation. Congratulations to Second and all the hard work they did!

As payment for our wager, we'll be making a $500 donation in Second's name to Presbyterian Hunger Relief. And we're working on plans for John Buchanan to be dressed in Colts gear for some embarrassing situation. I'm glad he's been a good sport about all this...you should be too since you won't need to start looking for a new youth pastor!

Again, my deepest appreciation to all who helped in this incredible Souper Bowl Challenge. This was truly a competition in which everyone wins!