With the arrival of cold weather, Sandra Burton is on a quest to provide 1,000 warm sleeping bags to homeless people in central Kansas. She teamed with Buzz Birney of Live Like Jesus Today Ministries to create the Rest Easy Sleeping Bag Project.
These sleeping bags aren’t destined for overseas or even hurricane victims on the coast, Burton said. There are plenty of homeless people right here who can use a sleeping bag.
“All of these are local,” she said.
“This helps people in a very special way,” Burton said. The sleeping bags will keep someone warm in temperatures of 32 degrees.
The farthest away these bags will go is within two hours of Great Bend. Birney makes monthly mission trips to Wichita, where they deliver food and other items to homeless people.
“We took a mission team to Wichita (on Nov. 9) and we took the 30 sleeping bags,” Birney said in a Facebook post. “If we had 150, we would have gotten rid of all of them.”
Burton said the reaction from the recipients was moving.
“It was a crazy day. They were so blessed,” she said. “They’re used to hand me downs or ‘gently used.’ When they get something brand new, they cry.”
She asked all 30 people to write down their names so she can pray for them by name.
Burton is buying sleeping bags in bulk online for $17.50 each or a case of 10 for $175. She is accepting donations at her business, Sandra Burton Massage, located in the Renue Salon at 1419 Main. Other options for donations are:
• Make checks payable to Sandra Burton, (or LLTJ for donation receipt). Mail to PO Box 154, Great Bend, KS 67530.
• Drop off cash or checks at First Kansas Bank, 4001 10th St. in Great Bend, KS 67530
• Pay online at Live Like Jesus Today Ministries.
• Put sleeping bags in the memo and please consider adding three dollars if using PayPal.
How it began
Burton knew she wanted to do a community service project and first considered a blanket drive. Then she learned that Rosewood Services already does that. There are also coat drives, shoe collections and other clothing drives. Finally, she thought of sleeping bags.
“I knew Buzz would be the best person to distribute whatever we have,” she said. As the cases of sleeping bags come in, they go to the Live Like Jesus Today Ministries warehouse in Great Bend.
Burton recalls she was singing in church when God put the number 1,000 on her heart as the goal and she believes that will be done before the end of the year. In October she met a personal goal to have 100 bags by the end of the month. The project has gained momentum since then.
“It’s going to be done by Dec. 31,” she said. “If five people donate $35 each, that is a case. Trinity Lutheran Church is paying for three cases.” Burton’s church, Heartland Community Church, and others are also participating. She also mentions the project most weeks at the Great Bend Chamber of Commerce coffees.
There are many fundraisers in the community and people continue to share what they have, she said.
“It’s just this circle of giving and giving. The generosity of Great Bend amazes me. It’s such a giving community. If a community the size of Great Bend can take care of so many, that’s a place where I want to live.”
