They remember what it's like to be at the epicenter of a natural disaster. Five years after Hurricane Katrina and the resulting floods destroyed most of their city, students at St. Paul Lutheran School in New Orleans, Louisiana, grieved with the people of Haiti struggling to rebuild life following the January 2010 earthquake. The students' grief turned into action.

Week after week, the students brought their offerings to Wednesday chapel, knowing that the money would be sent to Wheat Ridge Ministries' "Giving Gardens" project for Haiti. The preschool through eighth graders understood that in order to rebuild their lives, the Haitians needed basic necessities like food. Through "Giving Gardens," the students would be providing climate-appropriate seeds and training so Haitian families could grow sustainable fruit and vegetable gardens.

"(Students) responded unbelievably well. I was astounded," says St. Paul Lutheran School administrator Chuck Schiller who organized the project. "Where normally we might have $27 in the offering, we were getting double and triple that amount." Ultimately, the school raised $1,500 for "Giving Gardens" over 16 weeks.

Students like fourth grader Renni Kieschnick made personal sacrifices in order to participate. Renni used her free time to do extra chores and earn money for the chapel offering. "I took out the garbage, worked in the garden, cleaned up the house. It was a lot of hard work," she remembers. Renni says her motivation to work hard stemmed from personal experience. "A lot of people gave to us after Hurricane Katrina. I knew that if that earthquake happened somewhere around here, I'd be very thankful if people helped us."

Indeed, the shared history as natural disaster survivors resonated deeply with the St. Paul students. "(Haiti) wasn't just someplace somewhere. It became a concrete thing because they had lived through disaster themselves," Chuck adds.

"(The "Giving Gardens" project) was a chance for our students to be Christ-like to somebody else, when someone else had been Christ-like to them in the past," says Chuck.

For more information about Wheat Ridge Ministries' "Giving Gardens" project, please visit www.wheatridge.org/givinggardens.

Written by Jennifer Halupnik