Thursday, March 11, 2010

Coal Miner's Daughter-Kentuckey Partnership

Tammy Lawell is Hebron's director to the women's ministry and one of the leaders of our Kentuckey Partnership. I asked Tammy to share with us on how the partnership in Williamsburg and Corbin is going. Here is her blog.
It is hard to put into words how in awe we are at all the Lord is doing through our partnership with Appalachia right now. Our October trip to the Williamsburg/Corbin, KY area left many of us wanting to go back as soon as possible. Seven of us girls were able to return in February. One lady (Beth Gross) spent the weekend helping the missionary (Melany) with activities for the teenagers in the community. Beth learned the heartbreaking stories of several and is still in contact with some of them. Six of us arrived on Sunday night and stayed through Thursday. We saw snow and freezing temperatures everyday but had some beautiful photo opportunities! Our group of six worked to help organize donations at Melany’s warehouse. We were also able to catch up with individuals we had met in October while also making some new friends!
During our October trip, Ted Cone volunteered to drive a trailer full of supplies for us. While there, I asked Melany to show him around the warehouse in hopes that men’s teams could go and help with some of the work. The two of them were instant buddies! Ted has taken several of the guys there over the past few months to see the facility.
Last weekend was the first of many trips that will be planned to work at the warehouse and later, in the community. The first team had to be made up of electrical contractors who could re-wire most of the building. Ted and Eddy Sharpton led a group of 12 to travel there last weekend. Eddy’s brother, David, a pastor at Maysville Baptist, was able to go to help. One of the team prayed to receive Christ early last week. A second prayed to receive Christ on the ride up to Kentucky on Friday morning! That man’s wife prayed to receive Christ last night (Monday).
Melany and her family passed out flyers in the community over the weekend announcing the first-ever worship service to be held at the warehouse on Sunday. David preached the message and 10 individuals prayed to receive Christ. Another two rededicated their lives. Everyone involved can’t stop talking about how powerful the service was! Melany has already had lots of calls asking for services to continue there. The Director of Missions for her area is hoping to help start a church there. David termed it WOW (Warehouse of Worship)! (See picture below of prayer time at the end of the service.)
In addition to the changed lives, the Lord also allowed the team to get much more work done than they had anticipated! Most of the second floor is now re-wired including the family’s living quarters. One of Melany’s daughters has been going around counting the electrical outlets they now have and is thrilled to know she will be able to plug her nightlight in. The teenage daughter is thrilled to now have an outlet in the bathroom for her hair dryer and curling iron! Our guys were also able to install a furnace in the coldest part of the upstairs. (We could see our breath in most of the building the entire time we were there!)
Ted and Eddy will make a return trip there this coming weekend to work on the downstairs electrical system. In the next few weeks or so, they will be taking plumbing teams as well as heat/air teams. General construction teams will be needed later. Part of Melany’s ministry is doing home repairs so there are plenty of opportunities in that area as well. Eastern Kentucky is in what is known as the “poverty pocket of America.” Many live without electricity and/or in homes in very poor condition. The needs are great, but our God is greater! It is a privilege to be His hands and feet in that area!

Monday, March 8, 2010

A letter from a Haiti missionary

We had a team that has returned from Haiti. Jim Peevy, who is one of the team members, penned his thoughts in letter form and it touched my heart. Please read on:

Dear Friends and Family,

I want to share with you not only the events of my trip to Haiti but also some of the cool things God showed me along the way. The trip itself was pretty extreme due to mostly the travel that it took to reach our area of destination and the hot temperatures that we worked in. The team that I was a part of was made up of mostly people from Hebron and others from churches in North Carolina. Everyone on the team seemed to mesh well together and we were tremendously blessed by the work we were able to accomplish, the relationships we were able to build with the Haitians, and by the fellowship we enjoyed with one another.
After arriving in Santo Domingo at 2:00 pm on Saturday (Jan. 20), we stayed at the SCORE (Sharing Christ Our Redeemer Enterprises) complex in Juan Dolios until around 11:00 pm. During the wait time, we packed up three trucks with water, rice, beans, and cooking oil that would be distributed to the different areas in Haiti. At midnight, we embarked on a long, extremely uncomfortable 9 hour journey aboard a travel bus to the country of Haiti. Crossing the border was fairly easy during the wee hours of the morning so we arrived in Crox – de Bouquet at about 9:00 am. We stayed with Joel Hess, a missionary from SCORE, who lives on a gated compound with plenty of yard space for all of the tents we slept in.
After resting up for a while on Sunday afternoon, we all piled on the bus again and went to see for ourselves the devastation that took place in the city of Port au Prince. Pictures don’t due justice to what actually took place in this city. Buildings were crumbled on top of one another, there were stories of thousands lost lives, and you could see hundreds of tents which now represented the homes of the local residents.
On Monday, we started out by sweeping the floors of the school building where we were going to be constructing classroom walls. While we were working, many children and adults from the surrounding village would come by to see what was going on. Some of the children would want to join right in and help with whatever we were doing. While we were waiting on the building materials to arrive, I was able to meet a couple of young men, Jimmy (20 yrs old) and Marc (25 yrs old). Both of these young men were Christians and we talked about how God had a purpose for them living right here in Haiti. I told them how blessed I was to be able to see the joy in their lives even among the harsh circumstances. Over the next 3 days, I would get to know both Jimmy and Marc fairly well and I really grew to admire them.
As I and some of the other team members visited both the homes of Marc and Jimmy, Marc made it know that he enjoys playing basketball and that his favorite player is Kevin Garnett of the Boston Celtics. I told him if he could get us a ball we would play. That afternoon Cary Strange and I played pickup ball on a broken up concrete court with a group of Haitians that would high-five each other after good plays and argue any bad calls. I never dreamed I would get to play basketball in Haiti, so that was pretty cool. After basketball, we went over and watched some of our team members play soccer on a mostly dirt field. It was neat to get to hang out with all of the kids in the village and to see their passion for what they enjoy doing. We finished the day by having a time of devotion and worship back at Joel’s house with all of our team members.
On Tuesday morning everyone was moving a little slow because of the aftershocks that took place around 1:30 am. Everybody in the house had to come out and sleep in the yard with the rest of us, so it took a while for us to get back to sleep. The good part was that we continued to hear the people in the local church worshipping up until 2:30-3:00 am. Work continued that day on the walls in the school, but I spent most of my day visiting different homes around the village and the children in one of the local orphanages. My heart was broken to see the conditions that so many of these children had to live in and I even had a couple of them ask if they could go home with me. I believe God knows each of these children’s needs, but I continuously asked myself what I should be doing to help. We had a very powerful time of devotion and worship that night. It was awesome to hear how God was speaking to so many of us through the situations we had been in so far.
We started out Wednesday by going to visit the Good Rest Missions orphanage led by Pastor Bob Nunley. This amazing man is 74 yrs old and has headed up this orphanage practically by himself for the past 34 years. The needs are so many among the 60 children or so, but none bigger than for someone to be ready to take Pastor Bob’s place when the Lord has finished His good work in him. I believe God is preparing that person even now. Pastor Bob translated as one of our men shared the gospel through the use of an evangicube. The passion that Pastor Bob demonstrated while preaching to these children was extremely inspiring. I pray that I will be just as willing and determined to follow whatever God calls me to do throughout my life.
We did go on to finish up the school walls that day and we had a time of prayer with Pastor Wildo before we left the work site for the final time. It was bitter sweet that afternoon because as we were telling the people goodbye, you could sense that they truly did not want us to go and part of me did not want to leave either. Obviously I was ready to see my family again, but in some small way many of these people felt like family. You want so much to help their situation change, but I am thankful to know that so many of them do trust in God and believe that He is in control. May God calm their fears about the earthquakes and use the Christians as a witness during these uncertain times.
We left Joel’s house on Thursday morning at 4:30 am for another uncomfortable, long 9 hour bus ride, but the Lord brought us safely back to Juan Dolios and I rested well that night at the Embassy Suites Hotel. I thought a lot about the different people I had met and the different sights I had witnessed, and I believe God used many of them to teach my heart more about Him and more about others. First, God is alive and well in Haiti! The #1 accepted religion in the country is voodoo, but I witnessed Christians who were not ashamed of their faith and who appreciated the encouragement from fellow Christians. Second, there are people in Haiti who are much richer spiritually than many Americans, but we too often view riches from a materialistic point-of-view. Many of the Haitians we met are at peace with God because they have personally accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior and they have the assurance based on God’s word that they will be with Him in heaven when their life down here is over. Peace, joy, and assurance of Heaven. Now those are for sure some of the true riches in this life. Finally, the people of Haiti are just like people anywhere else. They want to be loved and know that you care. It’s amazing how God can connect the hearts of people even when there is a language barrier.
Sorry if the letter has been a little long, but there is so much more I could tell you. I just wanted to give you a small glimpse of how the Lord had worked while we were in Haiti. Thank you again for your support financially and/or for your prayers. I pray that if you have not had the opportunity to go on a mission trip that you will seriously pray for the Lord to make a way. That’s what I did and it was an amazing experience. God is good all the time and all the time God is good.

Sincerely,

Jim