Mission Community Church doesn’t even have a church to call home yet.
And it won’t for months.
But it is active.
At 9:30 a.m. on June 16, those associated with the church will hand out 40,000 pounds of food to those in need at House of Ride Nature coffee and skate shop on 2464 Second St.
In January, Mission Community Church handed out more than 36,000 pounds of food while also working with other organizations to help people impacted by Hurricane Irma.
“We shot out an email to 15 Title I elementary schools telling them about this,” said Jordan Roe, who founded Mission Community Church. “We wanted to show we care for kids and that families can have food on the table. It means so much. It’s not a lot of food but a grocery cart can bring assistance.”
Roe, who preferred not to be called a pastor “because I’m not big into titles,” previously was involved with New Song Christian Fellowship in Nashville, Tennessee.
He moved here days after Hurricane Irma with wife Bethany and daughters Madelyn, Kirsten and Harper. “We started to come down the week of the storm, then realized it wasn’t turning so we let the hurricane come through, then we came right down.
“But we felt were supposed to come into this area and start another church.”
Immediately, Roe started to get calls from people wanting to help.
“I told them we didn’t even have a church,” he said. “Our rental house had no power. But I invited them down.”
Groups included country singer Martina McBride’s Team Music is Love, which is a global charity initiative of song inspired projects that help people.
There also was One Generation Away, which has a dream that we can eliminate poverty, racism, and denominationalism in our lifetime. It also will be involved in the June 16 project.
There’s also Feed America First.
After the hurricane, Roe learned that people not only suffered physical damage to their belongings but mental damage to their minds and souls.
He also discovered that many people felt a lack of community after moving here from other areas.
So he held dinner parties where people ate and share their thoughts on life, faith and meaning.
“People had questions, they were looking for life and connection,” he said. “One of the things we also felt strong about was that a lot of people down here didn’t know each other. There has been a lot of new movement and growth. They have a lot of churches but there wasn’t a real space to ask their questions. We said, ‘Let’s create a dinner-party dynamic.’
“We’ve had wide groups of people who come for a nice, catered me. There’s no pressure, no follow-up, we’re not harassing them to come sign up.”
Roe said other church leaders have reached out, which has been a joy. He’ll continue to listen over the months, which help him get a feel for what the church needs. He doesn’t want to have a vision as much as he wants to serve what members feel the biggest needs are.
When told that a lot of his gatherings are based on food, Roe chuckled.
“It’s amazing what can happen when everyone gets their feet to the same table,” he said. “There’s a shared love and respect.
“Food is a necessity. It’s hard to live with the effects of hunger.”
If you go
Who: Mission Community Church
What: Food distribution
Where: House of Ride Nature, 2464 Second St. Fort Myers
When: 9:30 a.m. (volunteers welcome at 8 a.m.)