At 10:30 on a Saturday morning, Don London, 62, is already hard at work in his basement office at Stewpot Community Services on Capitol Street. Volunteers and service recipients come and go through his office with friendly hellos and practical questions.
As facilities manager, London's work at Stewpot consists of convening meetings, taking care of the grounds, playing piano for the daily interdenominational chapel service and heading the volunteer assistants program. "The volunteer assistants are a group of folk comprised of community members turning their lives around," London says, "and they do that by donating their time to us so they can learn to become, or at least start to become, productive people."
Providing daily meals, legal services, a food pantry, a clothing department and other programs, Stewpot serves transient and impoverished members of the Jackson community. "Stewpot believes that it is only through the medium of love that communities can be changed," London says, "and that love can be expressed in many ways."
A native of Brookhaven, London graduated from high school in Hattiesburg, then attended the Piney Woods School. He eventually fell into a life of alcoholism and drug addiction, which lasted several years. London later met Matt Devenney, who was the executive director of Stewpot at the time. Devenney and Luther Ott, Stewpot's former CEO, "really reached out to me when I didn't want to be touched, and when I really didn't want to accept any kind of love or help," London says. "But they stuck with it, and I just so much appreciate that."
Almost two years after he got his life back together, London began working at Stewpot, where he has been for nearly two decades.
"I was being prepared for this ministry by the defects of my life," he said. "One would have to have gone through alcoholism and drug addiction to understand how someone could take their rent money or take their house payment and buy drugs."
In addition to his work at Stewpot, London is chairman of the music department at Sweet Rock Baptist Church. "I consider myself a music minister," he says.
"I am a believer, and I guess that about sums it up."
London will spend his Thanksgiving serving others at Stewpot. "If there are persons out there who are feeling like I was feeling, just never give up, especially during this season," London says. "It's important that people reach out to one another."
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