By Beth Dotson Brown
One day while in the CAP office where she had been assigned to serve, volunteer Anita Rayner heard someone say she was short a cook to prepare food for a volunteer group. Anita volunteered to fill in. Little did she know that her offer to help would grow into a long-term volunteer commitment that has introduced her to hundreds of CAP volunteers over the past seven years.
“I love it. I get to meet so many nice people,” Anita says about her service. “I just feel blessed that CAP believes in me enough to keep me.”
CAP has seen what a dedicated volunteer Anita is, even rising long before dawn to prepare breakfast for groups who want to get out early to beat the heat. “That’s my service for the Lord,” she says.
It was 1997 when, Anita says, God sent her into the mission field after her husband died. She didn’t want to be a widow who only sat around in her senior years. “I think God has a bigger plan for us,” she says.
Anita served in Alaska, New York, Romania then in Alaska again. Both times she was in Alaska, she met former CAP volunteers who talked about how wonderful they thought the organization was. Anita took that as a sign that she should look into volunteering with CAP herself. In July 2004, she began her service.
She fell in love with the mountains and Kentucky when she moved to the eastern part of the state. Her experience has shown her it’s a place where people are down-to-earth, say what they mean and truly care about one another.
Anita has enjoyed volunteering as a cook as well as being part of the larger CAP community where she can begin the day with prayer. She considers the employees to have the same service orientation as the volunteers because she’s seen their dedication and knows they could earn more money elsewhere. “Because of their love for people and their values, they stay,” she says. She also sees CAP as being good stewards of the money it receives.
Living in a volunteer community has also been a new experience for her that she calls a work-in-progress. One of the benefits it has given her has been the opportunity to know people of other religions. When she was growing up, people in her town were prejudiced against Catholics. Two of the housemates Anita grew close to were a married Catholic couple. “They taught me so much about their faith and their religion. I learned to appreciate their dedication and way of worshipping the Lord.”
Anita has expanded her horizons through many experiences with CAP. “I think if you don’t learn something new every day of your life then you’re standing still,” she says.
When she thinks about the energy she’s devoted to CAP, she sometimes wonders where the sacrifice is because it has all felt so good. “We’re supposed to help and bless others but we’re the winners—we’re the ones who get the blessing.”
Even when Anita completes her volunteer commitment, she won’t be finished serving. She plans to settle in the area. “I’m going to become a Kentuckian after I finish. I know this is where God wants me.”
