On Sunday, Sept. 11, New Journey Lutheran Church and four partner Northeast Valley Consortium churches chose foster children as the focus of service projects for “God’s Work – Our Hands” Sunday.

Congregations in Fountain Hills, Scottsdale and Carefree packed personal hygiene kits for Arizona Helping Hands, Arizona’s leading provider of necessities to young children, teens and infants who are making transitions to foster care or among foster care placements.

Arizona Helping Hands distributes approximately 4,000 kits annually, a supply bolstered by 440 prepared by the five churches last Sunday. Participants added a handwritten note of love and good wishes to each recipient foster child’s kit.

“God’s Work – Our Hands” Sunday is a national project of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, an opportunity to celebrate the denomination’s identity as “one church, freed in Christ to serve and love our neighbor” with “every act of service, in every daily calling, in every corner of life - flow[ing] freely from a living, daring confidence in God’s grace.”

At New Journey, the Sunday service also included the blessing of 27 quilts completed for a group foster home by the church’s Sew Journers quilting group, with thanks to Fountain Hills community members who generously donate fabrics.

New Journey members, regular supporters of Extended Hands Food Bank, also brought food in support of the Islamic Speakers Bureau of Arizona’s 9/11 multi-faith food drive.

According to recent reporting by KJZZ.org, approximately 12,000 Arizona children are in foster care, a number that has dropped from 19,000 in 2016 through concerted support to families from the Department of Child Safety.

Still, the Annie E. Casey Foundation ranks Arizona 40th in terms of national child well-being. KJZZ.org noted that 1800 foster children were looking for homes as the 2022 school year began.