Greater Cabarrus Foundation Spotlights Solo Faith Church's Food Mission

At Solo Faith Church, everything begins with Jesus (Yahshua) and his command to love our neighbor as ourselves. This month, the Greater Cabarrus Foundation published a feature on Pastor Doug Lattimore and the food ministry growing out of our Concord congregation. We are grateful for the recognition, and we want to share the story with our own community.

The ministry started in an unexpected place. After Solo Faith Church secured a building in 2024, there were not enough chairs for the congregation. A fellow pastor connected the church with a ministry in Hickory willing to donate some. But before the truck was loaded, that pastor asked a question that changed everything: "Do you need any food?" Pastor Doug thought he meant food for his own family. The answer came back: "Not for you. For your community." That question sent him on monthly trips to Hickory to bring food back to Cabarrus County. When flyers went unanswered and families were hesitant to come inside, he simply set the food outside. When he came back, it was gone, and the real need in the community was clear.

Out of that need came a simple question: what if a family could request groceries the same way they access other services online, without traveling to a fixed location during limited hours? That idea became what is believed to be the first online food pantry in North Carolina, and one of the first in the nation. "It's about removing barriers," Pastor Doug told the Foundation. "If someone needs help, we want the process to be as simple and welcoming as possible."

An online pantry cannot solve every problem. For neighbors with limited mobility, the hardest part is not finding food, it is getting it home. So Solo Faith Church added a DoorDash-supported delivery program that brings groceries directly to the door, focused on senior citizens, military veterans, and residents with disabilities who face transportation barriers. And it carries more than groceries. "We do groceries and hygiene items," Pastor Doug explained. "The dashers will distribute hygiene items as well."

Solo Faith Church has also built AI systems into the pantry to help process requests and streamline deliveries, what the church believes is one of the first AI-automated food pantry models of its kind. The point was never the technology. It is that a small team can spend less time on paperwork and more time serving people, with dignity, at no cost and no judgment.

We are thankful to the Greater Cabarrus Foundation for telling this story so generously. As Pastor Doug says, Cabarrus County "was the first place where, when you reached out, the community reached back." Solo Faith Church is located at 587 Old Charlotte Rd SW, Concord, NC 28027, with worship Saturday and Sunday at 1:00 PM, in person and live-streamed. Every sponsored delivery puts groceries and hygiene items on the doorstep of a neighbor facing a transportation barrier. To sponsor a delivery, visit solofaith.org/giving.

Originally published on the Solo Faith Church blog: https://www.solofaith.org/post/greater-cabarrus-foundation-spotlights-so...

Community Support Note: This article highlights a feature published by the Greater Cabarrus Foundation about Solo Faith Church and Pastor Doug Lattimore. Quotes and details were responsibly compiled from that publicly available story to share it with our community.