It also can create a yearly Lenten focus that members will look forward to the way many anticipate the sharing calendar and the coin boxes. This will be particularly true if, over the years, congregations take the time to review the scrapbook entries from previous years at the beginning of Lent as they begin the current year’s activities. An important part of this activity will be including a record of the church’s promotional activities each year so that future participants can look back and remember, “Oh, that was the year we used the fishnets to gather all the coin boxes the Sunday we dedicated the offering,” or “Remember the skits the kids did about the different OGHS programs?”

Perhaps most important, it combines the stewardship perspective of the offering with the mission education aspects, a connection that is too easily overlooked. Two other resources may be key to making this connection: the Children’s Mission Yearbook (#70-612-05-451) and the list of projects supported by Presbyterian gifts to One Great Hour of Sharing in 2004. In the Children’s Mission Yearbook you can find mission stories from a number of other countries and interesting facts about those countries. To broaden the interest of a particular year’s Scrapbook entries, you can look up countries neighboring those highlighted in a particular year’s Scrapbook. The list of projects will tell you what each of the three OGHS programs is doing in that country. Look for this list to be posted in late February at www.pcusa.org/oghs. Please note that in addition to the specific projects listed there, your gifts are at work in many other countries through our partnership with Church World Service.

What countries are highlighted in Volume One of the Scrapbook for Mission?
Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the United States are the focuses for 2005. Both in the Balkans and in Afghanistan, the people are trying to make the transition between immediate relief from devastating wars to long-term community development and the building of a peaceful and prosperous society. The ministries of One Great Hour of Sharing are centered squarely on these issues as the focus shifts gradually from the emergency relief and refugee ministries of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance to the development ministries typical of the Presbyterian Hunger Program and Self-Development of People. Perhaps equally important for a first year of the scrapbook is the inclusion of the United States. It is sometimes difficult for Americans to see their own country as a mission field, and it’s important to realize that even aside from disaster response, we join with people across America experiencing a variety of needs to address their challenges in loving and creative ways.

What are some ways to use the Scrapbook to involve more members in our One Great Hour of Sharing efforts?

Assign different groups different tasks. Youth could look up related facts and photos on the Internet while younger children cut out the photos or color the borders for different pages. They work sequentially over several weeks, with a one-day event near the end of Lent at which the groups gather to put their work together.

Form three groups, each of which will do all the scrapbooking and publicity tasks for a different country.

Have a single scrapbooking day when all the classes and groups work on it together. One possibility is a world mission fair. Elements of this could include:

• Food. Serve food native to the countries highlighted. The Scrapbook for Mission includes recipes for each country—you can probably find more if you want to focus on one of the countries. If you want to focus on American food, you can serve an all-American meal with foods native to the Americas (including squash, corn, potatoes, peanuts, tomatoes, peppers, wild rice, pumpkin, cranberries, pineapples, avocadoes, lima beans, sunflowers, and chocolate). Or you can make it entirely a potluck, inviting people to serve food from their own culture of origin or from a culture that interests them.
• Decorations. Set up displays about One Great Hour of Sharing ministries in other countries. The scrapbook templates are based on an Afghan rug, a Balkans apron, and a quilt from the southern United States. Members may have similar textiles you can use with your displays.
• Storytelling. Reproduce a version of the poster art (downloadable from the One Great Hour of Sharing Web site) on paper tablecloths. Ask people at each table to add to the landscape by drawing items they think are needed (people, crops, water sources, schools, hospitals, and the like). Ask them to name their village and to make up a story to go with it, relating it to the theme of welcoming the stranger. When we meet someone from this village, which of us is the stranger? How do we feel when we meet the person—afraid, excited, happy, confused, or a mixture of feelings? Does that feeling change if we feel like we are the stranger coming to someone else’s village or if the other person is the stranger? What would make us feel welcome? How can we make the other person feel the same way?
• Storytelling. Ask each table to share its story with the whole group. Talk about how gifts to One Great Hour of Sharing help people provide for themselves some of the things needed.
• Music. Play the One Great Hour of Sharing video/DVD We Change the World while people are eating and/or working on projects (#70-612-05-115).
• Scrapbook activity. Have a “scrapbooking bee.” Assign small groups one of the three countries and then combine the completed pages into one or more scrapbooks. One small group could focus on designing the cover(s). It may be helpful to have access to an Internet connection and a color printer in case groups want to add images to what is provided.
• Giving. Consider receiving an offering. Ask children to decorate one of the blank fish banks (#70-612-04-125). Put the offerings in that bank and dedicate it as a gift from the whole congregation on the last day you receive offerings for One Great Hour of Sharing.

We hope these ideas stimulate your own creativity and that you will share what ideas work best in your congregation.

Send your comments to One Great Hour of Sharing, 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, KY 40202-1396, or by email. If the Scrapbook is as helpful as we hope it will be, it is a resource we can keep refining and improving for years to come.