Notice a family. Encourage a family. Support a family. 

Focus: Families in all kinds of seasons — foster and kinship families, single parents, new parents, children and young people, families experiencing hardship, and ordinary families who could simply use some encouragement. 

The foster-care spotlight in the service provides a tangible example of what it looks like to step into the lives of children and families and say, “You don't have to do this alone.” 

Care doesn't always require solving someone's problems. A meal, an afternoon of babysitting, an encouraging message or simply being present can make a significant difference. 

Individual & Family Ideas 

• Cook or buy a meal for a family. 

• Invite another family over for dinner. 

• Check in with a single parent. 

• Encourage a parent who seems overwhelmed. 

• Pass on good-quality children's clothing or equipment. 

• Offer gardening, mowing or practical help. 

• Welcome a new family at church. 

• Support or encourage a foster/kinship family. 

• Take a new mum or dad a coffee. 

• Pray specifically for a family you know. 

Connect Group / Ministry Group Ideas 

• Make freezer meals for families. 

• Create practical packs for foster-care placements. 

• Put together birthday packs for children in care. 

• Organise a working bee for a family. 

• Help a family move house. 

• Support a family after a new baby arrives. 

• Choose a family within the church to quietly bless. 

• Kids or youth groups could make encouragement cards for foster carers or families. 

Bible Verses 

Galatians 6:2 — “Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” 

1 John 3:18 — “Let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”

Notice the people who are usually busy noticing everyone else. 

Focus: Teachers, chaplains, first responders, healthcare workers, community workers, volunteers and others who regularly give themselves in service to others. 

There are people all around us who spend their working lives caring, teaching, responding, helping and serving. This week is about deliberately saying thank you. 

Individual & Family Ideas 

• Write a thank-you card to a teacher. 

• Encourage your local school chaplain. 

• Take something into a school staffroom. 

• Buy a first responder a coffee. 

• Drop a thank-you note or treat at a police, fire or ambulance station. 

• Thank a healthcare worker. 

• Kids make cards/pictures for people who serve. 

• Send an encouraging message to someone working in a caring profession. 

• Pray for someone you know who serves the community. 

Connect Group / Ministry Group Ideas 

Choose one group of community servants to bless together. 

For example: 

• Provide morning tea for school staff. 

• Make a care basket for paramedics. 

• Deliver treats to a fire/police station. 

• Encourage a school chaplain. 

• Make appreciation cards. 

• Bless staff at a local community organisation. 

• Pray together for local first responders. 

Don't Forget Our Own Church 

This is also a great week to notice people who faithfully serve at Lifepointe. 

Encourage people to thank someone who serves in Kids, Youth, worship, tech, welcome, hospitality, Mainly Music, playgroups, Connect Groups or another ministry. “Who serves me or my family that I sometimes forget to thank?” 

Bible Verses 

1 Thessalonians 5:11 — “Encourage one another and build each other up.” 

Philippians 2:4 — “Not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” 

Who has God already put in front of me? 

Focus: The people God has already placed around us — our actual neighbours, colleagues, school families, sporting communities, friends and people we regularly encounter. 

We can spend so much time looking for opportunities to make a difference that we miss the person living next door. Sit with someone different. Invite someone to lunch. Have coffee. Learn someone's name. Send an encouraging message. Care can begin simply by making sure people aren't invisible. 

Individual & Family Ideas 

• Introduce yourself to a neighbour you don't know. 

• Take over some baking. 

• Put someone's bins out/in. 

• Mow a neighbour's lawn. 

• Invite someone for coffee. 

• Invite a neighbour for dinner. 

• Check on someone living alone. 

• Offer someone a lift. 

• Walk someone's dog. 

• Help with a practical job. 

• Take someone flowers. 

• Offer to pick something up while you're at the shops. 

• Stop and genuinely have a conversation. 

• Invite someone to something you're already doing. 

Connect Group / Ministry Group Ideas 

• Host a neighbourhood BBQ. 

• Organise a community clean-up. 

• Do a gardening/maintenance working bee. 

• Help someone move. 

• Support a local community organisation. 

• Bless businesses surrounding the church. 

• Offer practical help to someone known to the group. 

• Host a free community activity. 

• Bless someone at Lifepointe you don't normally spend time with. 

Bible Verses 

Mark 12:31 — “Love your neighbour as yourself.” 

Luke 10:36–37 — Jesus concludes the Good Samaritan story with the challenge: “Go and do likewise.” 

Cross a generation. Listen. Learn. Encourage. Include. 

Focus: Building relationships between generations, with particular attention to older people, people living alone, widows/widowers and those who may experience isolation. 

Care goes both directions. Older generations have enormous wisdom, experience, faith and encouragement to offer younger generations. Encourage everyone to intentionally connect with someone significantly older or younger than themselves at Lifepointe. It could be as simple as: “I'd love to hear your story. Can I buy you a coffee?” 

Individual & Family Ideas 

• Visit an older relative or friend. 

• Call someone you haven't spoken to recently. 

• Invite an older person for lunch. 

• Help someone with technology. 

• Offer gardening or home maintenance. 

• Take someone shopping. 

• Kids make something for an older person. 

• Offer transport to church or an appointment. 

• Ask an older person to tell you their story. 

• Invite someone living alone into your family's activities. 

• Younger people ask an older person for advice. 

• Older people intentionally encourage a younger person. 

Connect Group / Ministry Group Ideas 

• Visit an aged-care facility. 

• Host a morning tea. 

• Kids make cards/artwork. 

• Youth offer technology help. 

• Do a gardening/maintenance working bee. 

• Invite older church members to a group dinner. 

• Create an intergenerational activity. 

• Record people's stories or testimonies. 

Bible Verses 

Romans 12:10 — “Be devoted to one another in love. Honour one another above yourselves.” 

Leviticus 19:32 — “Stand up in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God.” 

We care here. We care there. Distance doesn't determine who matters. 

After four weeks of looking at the needs immediately around us, Week 5 deliberately lifts our eyes outward. 

Focus: Global mission, Operation Christmas Child, missionaries, children and families around the world, people affected by poverty, displacement, conflict and disaster. 

Operation Christmas Child - make this one of the major tangible activities for the week. People could: Pack an individual shoebox, pack a box as a family, have a Connect Group packing night, Kids Church/Youth collect items, Ministry groups pack boxes together. Pray for the child who will receive the box and bring the boxes together as a whole-church visual response. 

Missionaries & Global Workers - use the week to help people know the people behind Lifepointe's global mission involvement. Introduce or reintroduce your missionaries: 

Where are they? Who are they serving? What does everyday life look like? What is God doing? What challenges are they facing? What are they currently praying for? 

Also recognise that caring globally doesn't always require leaving Australia. International students, refugees, migrants and newly arrived families can experience isolation and loneliness. Hospitality and friendship can be incredibly meaningful. 

Individual & Families Ideas 

• Write an encouraging message/card to a missionary. 

• Kids draw pictures for missionary families. 

• Choose a missionary to regularly pray for. 

• Pack an Operation Christmas Child box. 

• Pray for Christians in another part of the world. 

• Pray for people affected by war, poverty or disaster. 

Connect Group / Ministry Ideas 

• Pack OCC boxes together. 

• Have a global-themed meal and pray for that country/community. 

• Connect with one of Lifepointe's missionaries. 

• Send encouragement from the whole group. 

• Learn about a missionary's work and pray specifically for it. 

• Create cards/pictures/messages from children's ministries. 

Bible Verses 

Acts 1:8 — “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” 

Matthew 28:19 — “Go and make disciples of all nations.” 

Everyone has something they can give. Generosity isn't measured only by dollars. Sometimes the most generous thing we can give someone is our time. 

Yes We Care isn't something we did for six weeks. It's the kind of people Jesus calls us to be. The final week brings everything together, the emphasis isn't simply “give money.” 

Instead ask: What has God already put in your hands that you could use to bless someone else? It could be: 

TIME • SKILLS • FOOD • HOSPITALITY • POSSESSIONS • MONEY • ENCOURAGEMENT • CONNECTIONS • PRAYER 

Individual & Family Ideas 

• Pay for someone's coffee. 

• Buy someone's lunch. 

• Cook someone dinner. 

• Fix something for someone. 

• Give away something you could have sold. 

• Offer your professional/trade skills. 

• Help someone move. 

• Leave an anonymous gift. 

• Help with gardening. 

• Shout another family an activity. 

• Give someone a few hours of your time. 

• Invite someone into your home. 

• Write an unexpected encouragement. 

• Meet a need without being asked. 

Connect Group / Ministry Group Ideas 

What do we already have collectively that we could use to bless others? Look around the group. 

Maybe you have: tradie, gardener, cook, teacher, someone with a trailer, someone who can sew, someone who loves organising, someone with spare time, someone who has equipment. 

Bless someone using those skills, equipment, time and maybe a small amount of money. It doesn't have to be someone in crisis to choose someone and bless them simply because you can. 

Bible Verses 

1 Peter 4:10 — “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others.” 

Hebrews 13:16 — “Do not forget to do good and to share with others.”