Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/49128
Volume 28 Number 8 INSIDE DECEMBER 2011 NEOSA SOLDIER RALLY On Oct. 8, 700 people gathered at the Cleveland Metropark Zoo to celebrate Salvation Army programming. PAGE 8 MISSION ADVANCE 2011 In just four years, the USA Eastern Territory has trained almost half of its corps in Natural Church Development and Small Groups. PAGE 12 Miracle on Van Ness Street >> I t was a week before Christmas 2010 and the children in the after–school OUR PENNIES MAKE BIG SENSE How many pennies does it take to fi ll a Salvation Army kettle this big? PAGE 16 CHRISTMAS GREETINGS! Six pages of reports from the USA East's personnel and what God is doing in their lives out of the territory. PAGE 19 Good News! Online: www.SAGoodNews.org USA Eastern Territorial website: www.ArmyConnections.org USA National website: www.SalvationArmyUSA.org program at the Newburgh, N.Y., Corps were performing the nativity story in the building's rear gym. Meanwhile, in the corps' front offi ce, thieves were making off with Christmas gifts for 60 families. Lieutenant Sheila Gage, corps offi cer with her husband, Lieutenant Rohan Gage, recalls her fi rst reaction. "I fell apart. I started crying." Giving had been slow until then—so slow that Gertel Martin, the community outreach coordinator, had prayed that very morning for a tenfold increase in giving. Sheila remembers, "We looked at her that afternoon and said, 'You prayed for an increase and we just got robbed.' She said, 'But wait, wait, it will come.' " It came in an outpouring of compas- sion from the community. ROBERT MITCHELL At 9 a.m. the following Monday, a line of police cars came up Van Ness Street loaded with toys from the local Walmart. "We stood there crying because we didn't know what else to do," Sheila said. "It was like that for the next four days. Companies were coming from as far away as New Jersey and Long Island— just people who had heard what had happened, and they just kept coming. "People would come who you knew didn't have money. Individuals would show up with one toy that they just [had gone] out and bought." Radio stations and businesses held campaigns. As a result, the corps not only replaced the stolen gifts but had so many presents that it held a second toy distribution on Christmas Eve. The corps also was able to provide gifts for its continued on page 11 >> G OOD N E W S !