History

Circle City Relief settled in the 34th and Meridian community in January 2010 and has faithfully served on the School 60 parking lot every Sunday afternoon since. Each week, we serve approximately 175 people with over 200 rescued Little Caesars pizzas, more than 150 cups of soup, generous amounts of Chick-fil-A chicken, and countless bread, pastry, produce, and clothing items. Over the past 15 years, CCR has distributed more than 1.2 million slices of pizza and 3.5 million food items—along with over 1,600 large bags of Chick-fil-A chicken shared with partner organizations.

Beyond meeting physical needs, we connect people to emergency, transitional, and long-term housing, counseling, addiction recovery, detox programs, and our own in-house biblical counseling—ultimately pointing each person to a relationship with Jesus Christ, who is the answer to everything. We live out Matthew 25, where Jesus says, “Whenever you did one of these things to those who are overlooked and ignored, the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me.”

Circle City Relief began after Matt and Sandy Gay participated in short-term mission trips to New York City in 2009 with New York City Relief. Inspired by that experience, CCR launched Relief Services in June 2019 to help our friends move beyond dependency on organizations or agencies and toward lasting stability and transformation.

Over the years, we’ve had the privilege of serving alongside thousands of volunteers with compassionate hearts and a shared desire to make a difference. We extend heartfelt thanks to New Hope Christian Church, Northview Church, Crossroads Church, and many others for your continued partnership—you make this work possible.

Finally, a special thanks to our dedicated team for faithfully guiding Circle City Relief in the direction God has called us to go.

Impact

ome people wonder, what is Circle City Relief really all about?

CCR is more than a Sunday outreach. What people see on Sundays at the School 60 parking lot—the pizzas, soups, bread, pastries, and produce—is only a glimpse of what happens throughout the week. Every Sunday, we provide food in the form of rescued Little Caesars pizza, donated soup, fresh produce, and baked goods to individuals and families from the 34th and Meridian community who need help getting by for the day or weekend.

But during the week, that’s when the deeper work happens—the engagement, the relationships, the conversations that go far beyond food. Those moments lead to trust, to transformation, and to hope. Because nothing is more valuable than truly knowing someone. We can’t possibly help a person unless we know them—who they are, what they’re going through, what they’ve done about it, what they need, what they’re thinking, who or what they rely on, where their hope lies, what their plan is, what drives them, and most importantly, where God is in all of it.

Our Manna from Heaven Meals program extends that same heart of compassion beyond Sundays. Each week, rescued Chick-fil-A chicken—filets, strips, and nuggets—are combined with sides like mac and cheese and vegetables to create hot, ready-to-microwave meals for those in transitional housing, recovery programs, or struggling to make ends meet. We also share hundreds of large bags of Chick-fil-A chicken with partner ministries across the city to multiply the impact.

So while the food may draw people in, it’s the relationships that keep them coming back—and the hope of the Gospel that changes everything.