By Bob Holmes
In the sixth year of Columbia International University’s annual RAMServe community outreach, nothing like this has been attempted.
The RAM in RAMserve is the school mascot, but it also stands for Renewal Around the Midlands (of South Carolina). But this time, the effort reached across the globe as nearly 100 CIU students, including the baseball team, formed a food assembly line preparing 13,000 meal kits to be distributed to needy areas around the world by the ministry Rise Against Hunger.
Among those students was CIU senior Meg Johnson who helped make sure things ran smoothly. She explained that a dozen people would form a team in three stations to complete the work which included measuring, bagging and sealing each meal.
“It’s a beautiful opportunity — being able to serve, to know that you are doing it for God’s kingdom and being able to share that love and light with others. And to pray over this whole situation. It was very sweet,” said Johnson.
Serving Just Down the Road
Meanwhile, on a short drive off campus on nearby roads, one could spot the bright yellow RAMServe t-shirts worn by the CIU students doing litter pick up — trash bags in one hand and litter grabbers in the other. Just a mile down Heyward Brockington Road is Temple Zion Baptist Church where the ladies of the CIU softball team had exchanged their ball gloves for garden gloves. They were preparing the church’s community garden for spring planting. The church’s pastor, Dr. Andre Melvin says their work is important because the church is in a food desert, meaning there are no grocery stores close by.
“So, we have the garden. We give out the fruits and vegetables … that’s the goal for this community garden, to provide healthy food,” Melvin said.
Softball Coach Sara Allen says RAMServe fits into CIU Athletics theme for the year, “It’s bigger than a game.”
“It’s an opportunity to get a broader perspective on life, especially since student-athlete’s schedules are so busy with school, with their sport and training — they’ve got a social life too —sometimes you can get focused on the world around you,” Allen said, adding that serving others off campus gives her team “the bigger picture of what the community is like.”
Serving Across Town
RAMServe took the nearly 500 CIU students to a total of 26 sites across greater Columbia. One of those sites was Reconciliation Ministries, an outreach to those struggling with addictions. That’s where CIU students were helping to improve housing for the ministry’s residential recovery program. Among the students was senior Chase Knizek who has taken part in every RAMServe since his freshman year.
“I remember in my first year I helped remove a beaver dam from a church,” Knizek said. “Another year I cleaned a whole church.”
Reconciliation Ministries founder and lead pastor Lucky Detty, a CIU alumnus, says the work of the CIU students has an impact on the residents in the ministry’s program.
“It preaches a sermon I could never convey to the guys in the program,” Detty said. “It demonstrates that God changes people’s motives and hearts when they trust Him.”
(Above: Maddie Keran shares a light moment on the meal assembly line. Photo by Jonathan McGaha)
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