Photo essay: A Soft and Fuzzy Impact

Story and photos by Erik M. Lunsford

Four-year-old Journey Hudson of the small town of Fairmount, Minn., loves his fuzzy fleece blanket adorned with little dinosaurs.

“I use it when I sleep,” he said.

The Hudson family received the hand-tied blanket in a Christian care kit that was assembled by students at Martin Luther High School in nearby Northrop.

Over the course of several days, 55 students from the high school made about 500 blankets and bundled them into Christian care kits with Bibles, Pillow Pets, books from Concordia Publishing House and other devotional items. The kits were later delivered to a food pantry, a pregnancy resource center and a funeral home.

For the project, the high school received a $25,000 grant through the “Stand With Your Community” program, which was made possible by a partnership between the LCMS, Thrivent Financial and Lutheran Church Extension Fund.

That grant program is part of the Synod’s celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation this year.

“It’s really neat to see so many people — kids my age — all working together for this project,” said high-school senior Deborah Watt. “I became even more motivated when we heard about the direct impact our blankets were having on the community. Sure, we knew where they went and what they were for, but before we had that direct feedback, they were just cute fuzzy blankets we made and never saw again. “The blanket project is very special, I think, in that it pairs a physical comfort, a super-soft blanket, with a comfort for people’s hearts and minds in Jesus.”

It may be a super-soft and snuggly blanket, but for the Hudson family and others on the receiving end of the kits, it’s so much more.

Erik M. Lunsford (erik.lunsford@lcms.org) is managing photojournalist for LCMS Communications.

Posted June 1, 2017