photo by: Elvyn Jones

Volunteers prepare plates of food at the annual Community Christmas Dinner at the First United Methodist Church on Saturday, Dec. 25, 2021.

Saturday’s annual Community Christmas Dinner got started not with a miles-long line of guests waiting to enter the dining room, but with phone call after phone call from people wanting their meals to be delivered to their homes.

As the first diners stepped off Vermont Street and into the First United Methodist Church lunch room, dinner organizer Deb Engstrom sat in an office with a volunteer who was manning a busy phone, assuring callers that their meals were on the way. And an hour before, cars had been lined up for blocks around the church waiting to pick up meals for delivery, Engstrom said.

For 28 years, Engstrom has taken on the big logistical job of coordinating the annual Community Christmas Dinner. She said an ad hoc committee has organized the annual meal since 1993. The committee took over when the original community meal provider, the Flamingo Club in North Lawrence, decided it could no longer ask employees to give up their time on Christmas Day to support the effort.

“We took over, because as a group we decided the Christmas Day meal was something we could not not have,” she said.

The committee collects donations of turkeys, pies and money to provide the meal each year, and it relies on volunteers to do the work of preparing and delivering the food. Engstrom said that this year, 120 volunteers helped out. About 800 meals were delivered to people’s homes, and another 150 were served at the church or handed over for guests to take home, Engstrom said.

Among the volunteers working on Saturday were the father-daughter team of Howard and Natalie Harris. Natalie now lives in Parkville, Mo., but she came back to her old hometown to join her dad in volunteering for the meal. She said her parents were the first members of the family to help with the meal, and that they’ve since recruited her, her siblings and other members of the family to join them.

“This is what we do for Christmas,” she said. “It’s our family Christmas tradition.”

Howard Harris said he first started volunteering for the meal more than a decade ago.

“I like helping people,” he said. “There’s a lot of need for the homeless and the elderly. You get to see friendly faces. I saw a couple of women I got to know while undergoing rehab for knee replacement. It was good seeing them.”

Sitting at a table with four other men, Scott Rausch said the meal was good but that the best thing about the experience was the holiday company he was able to enjoy. He wasn’t able to travel to Sabetha to spend the day with his family, he said.

To his right was Michael Turner, who said the meal was a Christmas tradition for him.

“I volunteered to serve back when it was at another church,” he said. “I’ve been coming for the meal since.”

photo by: Elvyn Jones

Longtime Community Christmas Dinner volunteer Howard Harris spoons up more food on Saturday, Dec. 25, 2021, at First United Methodist Church.

photo by: Elvyn Jones

Michael Turner, left, and Scott Rausch enjoy their meals at the annual Community Christmas Dinner at the First United Methodist Church on Saturday, Dec. 25, 2021.