We serve our neighbors not just because Jesus calls us to do so, but because it is a joy! While we advocate for changes that ensure nobody goes hungry or is excluded from a full, healthy life, we also care for people in a hands-on way—sharing our blessings of time, talents and resources with communities in need close to home and around the world.
We work with our partner organizations to help feed people who are hungry, rebuild communities after natural disasters, and help our global neighbors in underserved areas access education, life-changing technologies and medical care.
Learn more about our Outreach ministries and find ways you can serve, for an hour, a week or throughout your life.
Faith in Action
LCR takes a hands-on approach working with the organizations we support, locally, regionally, and internationally. The ELCA featured LCR's work with one of our ministry partners, Manna from Heaven. We continue to grow in compassion and committment with every organization we support!
Local Ministries
Inter Parish Ministries (IPM) is a local nonprofit that provides food, clothing and support to those in need in eastern Hamilton County and Clermont Count. IPM empowers clients with information, support and services to improve their lives through the following programs:
- Client-choice food pantries located in Newtown and Amelia, Ohio as well as mobile and pop-up food pantries
- Fresh Start program to help families moving into new homes from adverse situations
- Back-to-school backpacks and school supplies program, including "power packs" of food to ensure students won't go hungry over the weekend
- Backpack program to help meet immediate needs of unsheltered people
- Christmas gift store for caregivers to select gifts for their children
LCR provides food and financial support to IPM through food drives and fundraisers, especially during our annual hunger appeal. Even our youngest members get excited to gather school supplies for IPM's Back-to-School supply drive!
We host IPM Mobile Food Pantries at LCR and collect food for IPM during our annual Souper Bowl of Caring. IPM clients also participate in our monthly Monday Meals program, and you can usually find some LCR members volunteering with IPM.
Once a month, LCR hosts a delicious, free meal for anyone in the community. LCR members bring food items and assist with serving and other aspects of the meal, and we are grateful to do so with the support of other community churches.
Most Monday Meals are held on the last Monday of each month, from 6 - 7:30 p.m. at LCR.
We regularly welcome between 75-100 clients from Inter Parish Ministry, the Southeastern Ecumenical Ministry and the surrounding area, who join us for dinner and conversation.
We are always in need of volunteers to provide food and help with clean-up. Volunteers can also help with set-up, serving our guests and running for needed items during the meal. This is a family friendly service opportunity where families and children get to work together.
We invite you to join us for some hearty food and happy fellowship!
Southeastern Ecumenical Ministry (SEM), founded in 1967, allows churches in eastern Hamiliton and western Claremont counties to accomplish ministry work they wouldn't be able to do as effectively on their own.
The SEM Food Pantry is a client-choice food pantry in neighboring Mt. Washington that partners with the Freestore Foodbank. It is staffed by volunteers and funded through individuals and SEM churches (including LCR) through financial and food contributions. LCR collects food contributions for SEM in a grocery cart in an alcove in our Sunday School wing. Volunteers are always welcome.
SEM also provides dinners for migrant workers at River Downs and the Belterra Racetrack while they are in the area each summer. LCR helps provide meals, and volunteers are welcome!
Regional & National Ministries
Manna from Heaven is a 501(c)3 nonprofit food distribution center located in rural southeastern Appalachian Kentucky serving over people 27,000 annually. We've been grateful for the opportunity to grow in friendship and hope while working with our friends in this historically underserved area over the past 11 years.
In addition to serving area individuals, Manna distributes thousands of pounds of fresh and frozen products and food assistance to many organizations serving the needs of the poor, including a local soup kitchen, nursing homes, the VA center and more.
Each month, our congregation and its friends make a 3.5 hour one-way drive to Myra, Kentucky with trucks and our LCR trailer full of tons of food, clothing, household goods and personal care products.
Our team collaborates with local, regional and national partner organizations, including Greater Good Music, Master Provisions, Northern Kentucky Hunger Relief, local restaurants, and with grant support from LCR's Outreach budget, ELCA Domestic Hunger, and Thrivent Financial.
In addition to our monthly trips to Myra, we also lead:
- Disaster response work after the devastating floods of 2022
- Seeds of Change program to provide sustainable food sources and gardening supplies for clients
- Annual meal-packing events and holiday food drives
- Giving tree Christmas toy drive
- And more!
We always welcome volunteers to help load and unload trucks on delivery day, and during events throughout the year.
LCR's Disaster Relief teams work to bring help to those in need following a natural disaster.
These disaster relief trips involve debris removal and semi-skilled construction work to help people most in need manage through an extremely difficult time. This work also includes walking alongside those recovering after natural disasters and providing emotional and spiritual support.
Since 2005, LCR has coordinated groups of interested members to help with disaster relief each summer in June. We have made trips to New Orleans, Iowa, Alabama, New Jersey, Kentucky, West Virginia and Maryland. Volunteers are welcome.
Read more about our disaster relief ministry in Living Lutheran magazine.
The Navajo Mission Preparatory Academy (NPA) is a school on the site of the Navajo Lutheran Mission in the heart of the Navajo reservation in Rock Point, Arizona. The school helps meet the educational, health, social and spiritual needs of the Navajo people in this community.
LCR's NPA Task Force supports the school's students, their parents and teachers sending supplies and gifts for Christmas and throughout the school year.
Volunteers are always welcome, especially for our Valentine's Day Bake Sale each February and our Fry Bread sale in the fall.
International Ministries
LCR's Guatemala Task Force functions as the support network for our member family, the Doppenbergs, who work as missionaries in Guatemala. The Doppenberg's ministry, Dream.Invest.Grow (DIG), operates out of the Centre of Hope in El Progreso, Jutiapa, Guatemala.
Through DIG, the ministry runs:
- The Centre of Hope - a school and community center for children with disabilities that provides therapies, counseling, tutoring, classes, medical and dental care, support groups, education opportunities, and nutritonal consultations, and more.
- The DIG Community Empowerment Program - a program that provides families with access to clean water, solar lights, smokeless stoves, nutritious plants and education opportunities.
- The Sanctuary of Hope - a legally registered and veterinary-attended animal rescue facility devoted to the rehabilitation and protection of rescued, abused and abandoned animals, as well as environmental conservation and reforestation.
LCR helps fund DIG's work through Outreach grants and fundraisers. We host the Doppenbergs when they visit Cincinnati and remain in touch throughout the year. Volunteers head to Guatemala periodically to assist with projects, deliver supplies and build relationships with the Mayan families DIG serves.
Through financial gifts and fundraising, LCR supports the work of the ELCA's Disaster Response team.
Lutheran Disaster Response shares God's hope, healing and renewal with people whose lives have been disrupted by disasters in the United States and around the world. When the dust settles and the headlines change, Lutheran Disaster Response stays to provide ongoing assistance to those in need.
Fair Trade is trade in which fair prices are paid to producers in low- and middle-income countries. This not only benefits workers, but helps eliminate poverty and promotes sustainable development that's better for the environment.
LCR began promoting Fair Trade products over 15 years ago.
The second weekend of every month, we sell Fair Trade certified coffee, tea and chocolates. This is not a fundraiser, but provides us an opportunity to educate members and guests about the importance of Fair Trade products and gives people an opportunity to purchase Fair Trade products locally.
If you want to give or receive a gift that benefits people in need in 80 countries throughout the world, be sure to check out ELCA's Good Gifts Catalog.
You can purchase a gift that is meaningful to you or the recipient that will benefit a family or community in need—anything from livestock and cookstoves to computers and healthcare. You'll recieve a card with information about your gift and can feel good knowing you made a difference.
LCR promotes the Good Gifts catolog through our Giving Trees at Christmas and encourages members to consider giving a Good Gift throughout the year.
- LCR Christmas Giving Trees
- Graceworks Lutheran Services
- Matthew 25 Ministries
- Northern Kentucky Hunger Relief
- Souper Bowl of Caring
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