By Tyler Pruett

tyler@southerntorch.com

RAINSVILLE, Ala.— A men’s bible study group from Collinsville Baptist Church is organizing the community to pack 100,000 meals for starving children in third world countries. Collinsville Baptist Church Youth Director Luke Laney is directing the event.

The event will take place this Saturday, April 30th at the Dekalb County Schools Coliseum in Rainsville.

The group from Collinsville Baptist is organizing the event for the “Feed My Starving Children” charity, that provides pre-packed meals for children in countries such as Nepal, Haiti, and Nicaragua. Each meal contains items such as rice, soy, vegetables, and chicken flavored vitamins.

“In 2014, I went to Nicaragua for a week in the summer, and while I was there we were using these meals for the kids in the school,” Laney explained. After seeing the meals put to good use, he decided to get his youth group and other members of his church involved.

“We went up to a mobile pack event for the charity in Chattanooga, then another in Ringgold, Georgia last year,” Laney said. “After that event, we quickly decided that we needed to bring this event to Dekalb County.”

The event will be organized in three different work sessions, each being two hours. Volunteers will pack different food components into bags, then each bag will need vacuum sealing and packing in a box.

“It’s an incredibly efficient way to come and spend just a little bit of your time and make a huge impact,” Laney said.

The group not only organizes volunteers to pack the meals, but must raise enough money to pay for the life sustaining food. Each meal costs 22 cents, meaning that to reach their goal of 100,000 meals, they must raise a total of $22,000 dollars.

The three packing sessions will be from 9 a.m. until 11 a.m., from 11:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m., and  from 2 p.m. until 4 p.m.. Participants must register online, but for now, Laney says that they’ve easily reached their goal of 500 volunteers, and all the sessions are currently full.

“Currently all our volunteer sessions are full, but we’re still accepting donations to reach our fundraising goal of $22,000 dollars,” Laney said. “We still need all of the help we can get and encourage anyone interested to reach out to us to get involved.”

The group is excited about the level of participation from the community, and so far has big plans for the future.

“We hope to double our goal to 20,000 meals by next year,” Laney added.

Visit their event page at http://www.facebook.com/twoormoremobilepack for information about the charity and how you can make a difference.