Home - Greene County Thanksgiving Outreach

You are Invited to Join in the Fun

and Receive a Blessing

We could have kept all this fun and blessing to ourselves, but we're glad to share with you both as individuals and as a church or other organization to join in the fun of the event and to receive a blessing. See below to determine the level of blessing you'd like to receive.

To receive just a little blessing:

send us some money. It's expensive to put on this meal and we can always use the financial help. If you'd like more blessing, keep reading.

To receive a larger blessing:

come to our planning meetings on Thursday nights beginning in Oct.

For yet a larger blessing:

volunteer to buy some drinks, make some cakes or heat up a pan of corn, green beans or mashed potatoes.

For an even larger blessing:

come and help that day. It takes a large number of people to work on the meal assembly lines, keeping the food hot and on the tables, and other odd jobs and clean-up. Nobody who has ever come to help has regretted it and you can be home in time for your own Thanksgiving meal with your family.

For the largest possible blessing:

Come and deliver some meals on Thanksgiving Day. You not only get to help us with what we do but also to see why we do what we do. You may run into the occasional freeloader, but overall you will receive far more from delivering the meals than even the people you deliver to.

A Little About Us:

This event, founded by and hosted at Cedar Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church at 4170 Newport Highway and sponsored by several area churches and organizations, is made possible only by the generous support of the people who are willing to give up their Thanksgiving morning to prepare, serve and deliver around 2161 meals to those in need in Greeneville and Greene County.

The first year Cedar Hill held this event, they served around 200 meals that they prepared, paid for and delivered themselves. The delivery system was to write people's names on slips of paper and toss them on a table, with drivers picking out which ones they would take.

The event has grown steadily over the years and this year there were 2161 meals served, with 13 churches directly involved in the planning and preparation of the meal and at least another 8 churches, Ruritan Clubs and Sunday School Classes providing financial support and use of their facilities. The delivery system involved at least 103 drivers and helpers covering 53 routes to deliver the meals that around 175 volunteers helped prepare on Thursday morning.

Last year's event was again of the smoothest and fastest in its history. In little over an hour, volunteers packed 1800 meals and all the delivery drivers were on their way in an hour and forty-five minutes, which averages to a route being packed and sent out around every 2 minutes.

There were 1983 meals delivered, up from 1580 in 2009, 178 meals picked up, up from 145 in 2009 and at least 40 people ate with us, making a total of 2161 meals, up from 2009's 1840.

The leftovers were picked up by the Tabernacle Presbyterian Soup Kitchen on Friday morning where they will feed several more meals to those in need.

See How We've Changed Over the Years

Pictures and Video from 2010

Photo Album and Video from 2009

Photo Album and video from 2008

For a photo album and even a few video of 2007, click here

For a photo album of 2006's event, click here.

For a photo album of 2003's event, click here.

An event of this size requires many volunteers both before and during Thanksgiving. Click here to see how you or your church or organization could help next year.