A lot of baking happened at the Allen house in June — nearly 2,000 cinnamon rolls went out the door, thanks to the skills of 12-year-old Meredith.
But Derek and Lindsay Allen both say they’re most thankful for the baked-in perseverance all those pastries honed in their daughter.
“A lot of the time she spent making and selling these cinnamon rolls was sacrificial,” Lindsay Allen said. “She could’ve been playing with friends or sleeping in … but the way God was using that to grow her character was really great.”
The idea for all the cinnamon rolls started about four years ago after Derek Allen became pastor of First Baptist Tillman’s Corner in Mobile. Meredith had been to Vacation Bible School before, but she found out quickly some differences at FBTC.
Like this — the girls compete against the boys with their offering gifts each year. The winner has the heaviest offering, not necessarily the biggest monetary amount. And the boys had won the past four years in a row.
Sweet victory
“That year was their fifth year to win,” she said.
So the next year, Meredith had a bake sale and raised around $800, then gave about $200 of her own money that she had earned too. She got it all exchanged into pennies to add weight.
And the girls won.
This year being her last in VBS, Meredith wanted to taste that sweet victory again. So she brought back the idea of the bake sale but modified it a little bit. Instead of a variety of baked goods, she focused on cinnamon rolls. And instead of just one sale, she decided to do it once a week throughout the month of June.
She called it Cinnamon Roll Saturday. Preparing the 40 dozen cinnamon rolls each week took a day and a half.
“I make it with sourdough bread, so I have to mix the dough and let it rise all day,” Meredith said.
She’d then roll it out Friday night, shape it into rolls and let it rise overnight before baking it and making the icing on Saturday mornings.
Her mom helped her advertise through Facebook each week, then they’d set up from
8 to 10 a.m. at a local park.
Lindsay Allen said they didn’t have to market as much as time went on because they “found that once people tasted them, they kept coming back.”
It’s been a churchwide effort, starting with the sourdough, Lindsay Allen said.
“One of our church members gave Meredith the sourdough starter and taught her how to make it in the first place.”
It all grew from there. And as the Allens set up to sell the rolls each week, church members came and bought them and gave donations.
One life group even came out and set up a table with free iced coffee and water for anyone who purchased cinnamon rolls.
“They helped us connect with people at the park and bless and thank the customers who came to show their support,” Lindsay Allen said. “We were able to meet people who were visiting the park and invite them to church and to VBS.”
In the end, Cinnamon Roll Saturday raised $2,610 for the VBS offering at FBTC, which will be split between three missions needs — a Send Network project in Puerto Rico, a missionary family in Southeast Asia and Gideon Bibles.
Derek Allen said he’s proud of Meredith’s perseverance, but he’s even more proud of the way she’s realized that, even though the girls won the competition, the real victory is what God is doing through the missions projects supported by the funds.
‘For His glory’
“God has given her baking skills to use for His glory,” he said, noting that she bakes treats at other times during the year too under the name Sugar Creek Bakery. “I thought it was something she might try and then get tired of, but she has taken on the responsibility of all the baking this month with perseverance and consistency.”
Then Meredith shared what God was doing with the other girls by splitting up the pennies among them and having them all take part in placing them on the scales.
“That was her idea,” Derek Allen said. “It’s all for the cause of Christ; it’s not about her.”
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