{"id":5259,"date":"2022-10-19T11:52:54","date_gmt":"2022-10-19T15:52:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/?p=5259"},"modified":"2022-10-19T12:08:19","modified_gmt":"2022-10-19T16:08:19","slug":"salt-and-light-with-a-side-of-spaghetti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/?p=5259","title":{"rendered":"Salt and Light, with a Side of Spaghetti"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Members of New Song Community Church made the most of a \u201csalt and the light\u201d opportunity by volunteering at the Rotary Club of Bethel Park\u2019s annual spaghetti fundraiser on Saturday, October 8, 2022 at the Bethel Park Community Center. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout the day\u2014while the meatballs and sauce were flying out the door\u2014church members packaged food, served food, washed dishes, cleaned tables, and did whatever needed to be done. However, they made their greatest impact by serving others without expectation and through having spiritual conversations when the opportunity presented itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was about being the church and being the light. It felt like we were a bunch of little candles of light running around and helping people out,\u201d said Mike Fitzgerald.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He volunteered with his wife, Jessica, and teenage son, Luke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jessica Fitzgerald admitted she normally despises doing the dishes but felt a wave of positive emotion roll over her when washing out the tomato-stained pots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis overwhelming joy came over me,\u201d she recalled. \u201cThis experience of serving with like-minded Christians, I wondered, is this what heaven is going to be like?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Proceeds from the rotary club went to a nonprofit that supports military veterans by providing them access to service dogs. In total, 1,000 meals were prepared that day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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While volunteering that day, church members were asked several times by people which church they were with. That opened the door for conversation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe people I spoke with aren\u2019t hungry for spaghetti; they are hungry for relationship,\u201d said church member Sharon Burke. \u201cEvery table we went to, there was an opportunity for relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus urges his followers to be the salt and the light in the world. He tells them: \u201cIn the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.\u201d (\u202d\u202dMatthew\u202c \u202d5:16\u202c \u202dESV\u202c\u202c)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New Song takes that to heart by using service opportunities to be on mission for God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Members of New Song Community Church made the most of a \u201csalt and the light\u201d opportunity by volunteering at the Rotary Club of Bethel Park\u2019s annual spaghetti fundraiser on Saturday,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5277,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[94],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5259"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5281,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259\/revisions\/5281"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsongpittsburgh.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}