I am one of the co-founders and board members for The One, Inc., we operate The Van that has been featured on K-LOVE radio, Sync Weekly, and just about every television and radio station in Central Arkansas. Our primary focus is outreach and support through demonstration of Christ’s love to those in dire need of assistance. Yes, we drive a beat up old van with spray painted names and testimonies written on it in sharpie to some of the darkest regions to deliver food, supplies, and love to our homeless friends. No, we probably don’t look like any other non-profit organization that you have ever worked with before or heard of. Our goal is to be as authentic and transparent as humanly possible with our ministry and we make no apologies for that.
The purpose for this post is to ask my friends, family, and anyone reading this post to consider partnering with our organization. We have a huge vision and while God has already blessed us in so many ways to allow us to help bring to fruition projects like portable showers, laundry services, food, water, tents, clothing, warming centers, etc., there are so many other needs and areas that we feel God is calling us into that quite honestly we are going to need a lot of partners if we are to reach these goals.
In the coming weeks we are going to be offering armbands and t-shirts for sale as a fundraiser on our website. The proceeds from the sale of these items will go directly to providing much needed resources for our homeless friends. We would appreciate everyone’s support when these items become available. Stay tuned to our facebook and twitter accounts for announcements about this.
One other thing that I wanted to throw out, we get a lot of requests from people asking what they can do to help out. Many people are honest in that they would love to write a big check to help out our mission but are unable, and we appreciate that more than any of you can imagine. The truth is, we can put every dollar we bring in right back onto the streets quicker than you can imagine. But, there is something I want to throw out there to everyone for consideration…
Being a small non-profit we have overhead costs, a lot of our overhead has already been met by donations from some very generous people but there are still things like gasoline for the van that are ongoing. We have a large surplus of items such as clothing, water, food, MRE’s, feminine and hygiene products, shoes, sleeping bags, tents, etc., that we have to store because the van will only hold so much when we go to the homeless camps. We would like to rent a storage facility to store these items in but the costs for storage space that we can access 24/7 is a lot more expensive that you might think.
We would like to be able to rent a facility that is our own, and that we can access any time of day that someone is in need and hook people up with the basic necessities needed for survival on the streets. In the past we have always strived to put every dollar donated into the hands of those in need in the form of clothing, food, water, etc., but we are having to step back and look at the big picture and realize that if we had our own facility we could do so much more and be a lot more efficient in our mission.
“This is a great cause to be involved with…” – Colleen Nick
The purpose of this post is to ask my friends, family, and neighbors to consider making a tax deductible monthly commitment to The One, Inc., to help support our ministry. This monthly commitment doesn’t have to be anything huge, $10, $20, or $50 monthly will go a long way to help fund our mission and secure a location from which we could operate permanently. I am asking everyone to consider this and to pray about it. If this is something you are interested in doing, we will have a link that we will post very soon for you to signup online to make a monthly commitment. One other thing that I will add, our organization is built upon transparency, and anyone supporting our mission is more than welcome to look at our financials anytime they want. We have nothing to hide and our intentions are pure and we love to be held accountable!
Questions or Comments?