Chapelstreet Church opens Shepherd’s Heart Care Center in Geneva

GENEVA – Twenty years ago, when Chapelstreet Church was still known as First Baptist Church of Geneva, they started a little food pantry out of a closet and people received prepackaged food bags.

The small Shepherd’s Heart ministry has now grown into Shepherd’s Heart Care Center, taking up the first floor of the South Street Campus, 2300 South Street, Geneva.

Shepherd’s Heart is now an umbrella ministry, with a Compassion in Action financial assistance program for emergencies; a Budgeting Team that helps people learn to create simple budgets; a Legal Clinic; Master’s Hands, where once a month, men serve widows, single mothers and the elderly who need things fixed or yards maintained.

“We evolved over the 20 years where the ministry was really just a little food pantry,” said Erin Wise, director of Sheperd’s Heart ministry for the church. “We saw a couple of families a week then. Now we see 1,400 people a month.”

As the food pantry expanded, Wise said they began to see that people needed more than food. So the church developed a Compassion in Action Team that would help people in financial crisis.

“It could be a single mom in Aurora. It could be a family in Geneva that was struck by a health crisis,” Wise said.

“Whatever the situation was causing them not to pay their utility bills or their rent, they could apply for assistance and we would meet with them as a team and pray with them,” Wise said. “And brainstorm the situation. If they were in a temporary time of crisis, we could give some funding to help.”

Then they began to see the same people coming back again and again, she said.

“What was causing them to stay in this spot? Was it a job crisis? A budgeting issue? A legal issue?” Wise said. “What was it keeping them from moving forward?”

The church developed the other teams to become part of a solution, she said.

That’s where they formed a budgeting team to help families learn to manage their money and come up with simple budgets.

“We now have a job coaching team where we have actual, licensed recruiters who volunteer time and work with people until they get employed,” Wise said.

The attorneys who are in the legal clinic do not represent the people, but listen to their stories, help organize their paperwork and give them resources, Wise said.

The Master’s Hand ministry is made up of 40 men of the church who help out the first Saturday of every month to fix things, address safety issues, shovel snow, clean out gutters for widows, single mothers and the elderly.

To create the new Shepherd’s Heart Care Center, the church remodeled the downstairs area to accommodate all the ministries. It has a lobby with benches, couches, tables and a conference room, she said.

The food pantry is large and those who use it pick out their own food, rather than get prepackaged bags.

“We are in a wonderful relationship with the Northern Illinois Food Bank Direct Connect, which is in relationship with different grocery stores,” Wise said. “Every week, we get deliveries from Meijer, Aldi, Fresh Thyme and The Fresh Market in Geneva. They give us things to stock our freezers and refrigerators and we get non-perishables from our parish.”

The success of the Shepherd’s Heart ministry is that church members develop relationships with the families and individuals they serve, Wise said.

“It’s one thing to go to public aid and get a number and stand in line, ‘This is what you get.’ It’s another thing to have a relationship with someone and grow through the ministries,” Wise said.

Shepherd’s Heart has 241 volunteers for the ministry teams.

The church’s members donate to support the financial assistance Compassion in Action gives to families in crisis, Wise said.

“Every church gives money to those in need, but some have to belong to that church,” Wise said. “The Bible says to help those in need. … We help those in need.”

She described how they always had enough in the checkbook to provide financial assistance.

“We’d have a $300 balance in the little checkbook. It would be depleted. Then it would be $300 back, plus a little more,” Wise said. “Every time we gave, God blessed us … and we were able to be a blessing to others. Even despite covid and and all these people needing money because of COVID, we have been able to help them.”

Chapelstreet Church also has a Keslinger Campus at 3435 Keslinger Road, Geneva and a Mill Creek Campus, 1S455 S. Mill Creek Drive, Blackberry Township near Geneva.