Thrive! works with leaders to develop their skills in many areas, and personal finance is one of them. Milo Kelley leads Financial Empowerment sessions. The most recent set of classes discussed the following:

• Five ways money is used and the tools to coordinate among them
• Purpose of a spending plan and how to develop one
• How to apply the information to make a difference 

Participants in the class built their own individualized spending plans, identified a number of local agencies and resources, and discussed how to use those resources.
For more information on the classes, contact Milo Kelley at [email protected]. 

On Father’s Day, the First United Methodist Church men’s choir sang of “walking a mile in my neighbors’ shoes,” and it stirred the souls of people around me in the pews as well as my own heart. That’s what Thrive! is about — walking alongside people who live each day with stress. Have you ever experienced:

• having no way to put gas in your car to get to work?
• having no food for the weekend because you couldn't leave work to get to the food pantry before it closed, or because you couldn't get the correct form or voucher to bring back to the church to get food? 
• having no words to express your fear when you know your child is really sick but you don't have a medical card that covers her because you can't afford to get additional copies of her birth certificate and you don't have a scanner to get them uploaded into the system?

Imagine all of this happening at once!

Walk a mile in these shoes. Not everyone is prepared to feel the anxiety and anger that can come from walking with our Thrive! leaders, but I encourage you to try. You won't be alone if you do. Sturdy souls, caring hearts, and community is what it takes. 

—Elaine Johannes, co-president of the Thrive! Board of Directors