PITTSTON – When Rev. James Breese took over the First Baptist Church in 2016; it was his very first assignment in pastoring a church. He wasn’t quite sure the direction his ministry would take but it didn’t take long to figure it out.
Early in his ministry, Rev. Breese wanted to help the needy during Thanksgiving creating the church’s first turkey dinner on the eve of Thanksgiving Day by opening the First Baptist Church doors to everyone and anyone in need or alone to have a traditional turkey dinner.
“People are willing to help because this is real and are literally starving and families have to choose between eating and paying the rent,” Rev. Breese said. “Helping the needy has solidified it for me and that let me know that this truly is what God wants us to do.”
Over the last 12 years, Rev. Breese and his church have fed thousands at Thanksgiving giving away hundreds of meals each year. All totaled, 30 turkeys were donated for the dinner.
“It’s going great and when I came in you can see right away the amount of people that want to help from our church,” Rev. Breese said as he arrived Wednesday evening for the turkey meal giveaway. “Outside of our church there are people that called, donated money, resources are all here including students from Pittston Area, 2nd Presbyterian Church, Meals on Wheels and others that are all pitching in.”
“Anybody that wanted to help could do so whether monetary, food, donations or just coming up to help, it truly is a community thing for people that are in need,” Rev. Breese added.
In addition to handing out a traditional turkey dinner, toiletry items, and hats and scarfs were given out.
Drivers delivered dinners to many shut-ins not able to make it to the church from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. before in-house dinning took place.
“I think it’s really great, it helps a lot families that are maybe in need this holiday season and also a lot elder citizens that might not have family left they can come here and interact with the community which is really nice,” Miranda Romanofski, who has attended the annual Thanksgiving dinner in the past, said.
First time goer Ashley Owens, of Exeter, was with other friends for dinner. “It’s nice and there was plenty of food,” Owens said. “I’ll probably come back next year.”
Many students from Pittston Area, including members of the Key Club, were volunteering on the service line.
“I’ve been doing this for four years and I like helping people,” 12-year-old Carlena Lizza said. “It makes me happy to seeing everybody happy when they eat.”
Rev. Breese, his wife First Lady Sherrell, and other members of the congregation held many weekly meetings to make the Thanksgiving meal happen including the Pittston’s Meals on Wheels organization that offers their kitchen to cook the turkeys.
“It takes a long time for prep work but they get it all together,” Rev. Breese said. “We make sure we have the right amount of turkeys the food that need necessary so we make sure we feed everyone that comes in our doors.”
