On the night of April 15th, as Americans scrambled to mail their 2007 income tax forms, members of Pathway Church (Palo Alto, CA) eased the suffering by giving away 1,000 free postage stamps.
As a “Planned Act of Kindness,” they created 500 mini-books of stamps (outreach cards with 2 stamps each). Standing on the streets near a post office, they held signs stating “Free Stamps! Tax-Day Relief!” as they gave away the mini-books. Scott Aughtmon describes people’s reactions as,
They were so surprised and thankful, you would’ve thought we paid their rent/mortgage for a month! Even people driving by who didn’t need or want a card rolled down their windows and told me, “That’s so cool what you’re doing!”
I like the creativity of this outreach. It ministers to people during one of the grumpiest times of the year and gives them a moment of happiness.
For Discussion:
- Have you heard of any other tax day ministries?
- What are some other creative Planned Acts of Kindness?
This is a great way to reach people. My church plant did it every year for six years. The Vineyard in Dayton, Ohio and Cincinnati have been doing it for about 15 years!
Kent,
I have a great idea! Will some church sponsor me this year and help me pay my tab to the IRS? What a way to ease my suffering! If not me…maybe someone else can benefit. : )
@James
Matthew 22:21
My church handed out batteries, with the time change occurance, so people could replace their smoke detector batteries. Worked really well.
We bought down the gas $.30 per gallon for the community. There were lines for hours waiting to get into the gas station. It was awesome.
But it doesn’t say anything about the IRS or that somebody else can’t give to Caesar on behalf of [insert name]. LOL.
[...] Tax Relief servant evangelism. Great idea. Check it. [...]
That is so cool! Never thought about giving away stamps. Love the random acts of kindness.
Hey Kent,
Thanks for the mention. Yeah, we definitely didn’t invent the idea. I saw it on http://www.servantevangelism.com/main.cfm and we did it 2 years ago for the first time. People loved it, so we wanted to do it again.
We missed last year, cause of too much going on, but were able to pull it off this year.