Our Savior's Lutheran Church barely beat Grace United Methodist Church in pounds of food donated to the Lakes Area Food Shelf in Pequot Lakes.

The two Pequot Lakes churches held a challenge to raise food and money for the food shelf, with the "losing" church hosting an ice cream social for the other congregation when the weather gets nice.

Our Savior's raised 604.2 pounds of food to Grace United's 598.8 pounds. However, Our Savior's took a wide lead in dollars donated with $11,000.09 to Grace United's $4,359.35. Both church pastors agreed, however, that the Lakes Area Food Shelf patrons are the real winners when the totals were tallied Tuesday morning, March 23, at the food shelf.

"Even as we were adding our stuff up we said there was a really strong possibility Our Savior's was going to beat us," said Grace United Methodist Church Pastor Jennifer Matthees. "We were so proud of what we had done, and we said if they can do better than that, what an incredible win for the food shelf. What an incredible win for the community."

"March is the month where I think they thought any money that's brought in is matched," said Our Savior's Lutheran Church Pastor Stephen Blenkush. "So our $10,000-plus all of a sudden becomes $20,000. And the food shelf can buy far more food than we ever could even if we went to Costco. So, yeah, the food shelf will benefit and the folks from the community who are dependent on the food shelf are going to be the winners in all this."

The two congregations agreed to compete for the most donations for two purposes. One was to help the Lakes Area Food Shelf during Minnesota FoodShare Month when donations go further and help determine what the shelf will receive from various organizations throughout the year.

They were also hoping to increase and strengthen interaction and cooperation between different congregations in the community.

"I had met with Pastor Stephen and we both mentioned that when you first join a new church the first thing you hear from the search committee is that they want to see a collaboration between pastors," Matthees said. "You hear that mentioned, but you don't really see it in a lot of communities."

Matthees was impressed with how her congregation handled complications from the coronavirus pandemic.

"With COVID, people are just starting to come back to churches," Matthees said. "To see people rally around this felt like it was a good thing to be doing at this time. We were unsure in the start with numbers not being what we are used to."

Blenkush hopes the ice cream social will serve as another opportunity to interact.

"The other thing that I think is really important and valuable is that this is an event with two churches in town that otherwise probably had not been involved with anything together before," Blenkush said. "So I think we're all looking forward to that day when we can have that ice cream social and have folks from Grace United Methodist and Our Savior's get together and just build a little bit more sense of community."

"We're looking forward to that as a way to really start to build more friendships and relationships together," Matthees said. "I was hoping maybe not to just have the ice cream and party thing, but maybe we can do a hymn sing or something simple to see the ways that we really are one people and kind of on the same page."

Travis Grimler may be reached at 218-855-5853 or travis.grimler@pineandlakes.com. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter at www.twitter.com/@PEJ_Travis.

1/4: Lakes Area Food Shelf Interim Director Tim Moore gets donation totals from Our Saviors Lutheran Church Pastor Stephen Blenkush and Grace United Methodist Church outreach team member Peggy Johnson on March 23 at the Pequot Lakes Lakes Area Food Shelf building. Travis Grimler / Echo Journal

2/4: Lakes Area Food Shelf Interim Director Tim Moore gets donation totals from Our Saviors Lutheran Church Pastor Stephen Blenkush and Grace United Methodist Church outreach team member Peggy Johnson on March 23 at the Pequot Lakes Lakes Area Food Shelf building. Travis Grimler / Echo Journal

3/4: Lakes Area Food Shelf Board Member Cindy Lubke lugs boxes into the food shelf as they are delivered by congregation from Grace United Methodist Church and Our Saviors Lutheran Church in Pequot Lakes on March 23, 2021. Travis Grimler / Echo Journal

4/4: Lakes Area Food Shelf Board Member Cindy Lubke lugs boxes into the food shelf as they are delivered by congregation from Grace United Methodist Church and Our Saviors Lutheran Church in Pequot Lakes on March 23, 2021. Travis Grimler / Echo Journal