There were boxes of food lined up next to lines of cars in the parking lot at Community Missionary Baptist Church in Cedar Hill on Wednesday morning.
"We know that food is still a big issue," Deacon Stephen Jackson said. "The availability, the price of food, is still a big issue."
That's why Community Missionary Baptist Church planned enough meals with the North Texas Food Bank to feed 3,000 people for Thanksgiving. Volunteers chatted with recipients and worked in assembly-line fashion to get boxes of food into cars.
"Let them know that we're not just out here just to hand out food," volunteer Lisa Snead Crawford said. "Want them to know they're appreciated."
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Food insecurity in Dallas County is 47% higher than the national average; 1-in-5 children in North Texas is food insecure.
"You kind of take everything for granted," volunteer Christopher Suarez, a high school student from Frisco, said. "Seeing all these people who need food, it kind of gives you a different perspective of how many people actually need help."
Jackson said it's all part of the church's mission to feed bodies and souls.
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"That's what ministry, true ministry is all about. We gotta get outside the four walls that is a building. That is not the ministry, the ministry is here," Jackson said putting his hand to his heart. "You gotta love your brother as you love yourself, not just in words...but in actions."
