Community & Business
28 October, 2022
'Learning to serve' theme of prayer breakfast
The 7th annual Mayoral Prayer Breakfast raised funds for Pittsworth State School Chaplaincy and shared a message about the importance and joy of helping others.
Guest speaker Nat Spary gave an inspiring and moving talk about his journey into a role where he is helping young people reach goals that might previously have seemed unattainable. He can relate, he’s been there.
Nat and his wife Tiff run BASE Services, a not-for-profit organisation in Toowoomba helping individuals and families, a community development organisation, that works with individuals and families who are homeless or at high risk of homelessness, ex-service people, and those with health issues, addictions or behavioural issues or trauma as a result of abuse, family violence, separation, grief or loss.
Basement Soup Kitchen and 2nd Shot Café are among the enterprises run by the organisation.
Nat shared how he would “take drugs to numb the pain” in his younger years.
“And I’ve got nothing to say about drugs because there’s nothing to glorify it, it just takes from you, it strips you and it makes you worthless and hopeless.”
“One day I was questioning ‘is there a God... why am I here’ and found myself in church.... and I saw something I hadn’t seen and that was love.
“I actually stopped doing drugs, I was still homeless, still couch surfing and there was a lot of issues I still had to get through but one of the big highlights of my walk of finding freedom, was these men in the church that used to meet up with me and help me with my struggles.
“Not once did they judge me... they listened to me and some great things started happening.
“I started serving in the drop in centre where I had been eating for so many years.
“That was a turning point in my life as well, serving others. When you serve others you take the focus off yourself.”
See the full story in this week's Pittsworth Sentinel
