donations for transport to Melrose Baptist, where 1,000 disaster relief buckets would be packed
for hurricane victims. (photo by Debbie Adams)
Vinton Baptist Church recently partnered with Grandin Court Baptist, Melrose Baptist and
Radiance Community Church and Church of Hope to pack 1,000 disaster relief buckets for
victims of Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
Vinton Baptist’s assignment was to gather some 12,000 items specified by the Cooperative
Baptist Fellowship (CBF), including liquid laundry detergent, cans of spray air freshener, and
soap-less scouring pads.
Other churches contributed concentrated household cleaners, bottled dish soap, insect repellent,
reusable cleaning wipes, clotheslines and clothespins, and heavy-duty trash bags. Melrose Baptist secured a donation of 1,000 five-gallon buckets from a local hardware.
store donated 1,000 buckets for the hurricane relief project.
The Vinton Baptist congregation and the community collected donations through the end of
October, and on November 1, a large crew gathered to load a trailer to move the donations to
Melrose Baptist on Peters Creek Road, where 600 buckets of supplies were assembled on the
afternoon of November 3 during a “Pail Packing Party.”
After the buckets were packed, their destination was the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and
Impact Missions headquarters for distribution as needed to those most affected by the recent
hurricanes. The churches plan to reach their goal of packing 1,000 buckets over the coming
months.
“It is our prayer that our work in collecting supplies to pack disaster clean-up buckets will be a
symbol of love to those who are continuing to deal with the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and
Milton,” is the message from the churches. “We hope that whoever receives the buckets we pack
remembers that there are neighbors, even hundreds of miles away, that love them and are praying
for them.”
