Thank you for the prayers

We felt your prayers in Mississippi. The week was productive, inspiring and educational. We need to be very proud of the United Methodist Church. It is the only denomination still present for continued recovery. The UMC committed $77 million to the Katrina Recovery. 165,000 volunteers have been involoved, saving the recovery effort over $110 million! What a testimony to the willingness of God's people. We were told that this effort is helping those whom no one else would help. Our homeowner is Mr. F. A. McKee. He has had a stroke. Someone local agreed to help him, but he took the money and totally messed up the whole house. So, the Disaster Response team built him a small house from ground up. You will be pleased to know the organization was phenomenal and frugal, watching every penny. A local electrician who is also a volunteer said that we were one of the best teams he had every worked with. We were so touched by that compliment because he has worked with a lot of teams over the 5 years.

-Susan Phillips

Final Touches

It's been a great week in Mississippi. David said that it was the best ever to the Gulf Coast. A lot of work was done to the home for Mr. McKee and it was ready for him to move in. The team enjoyed the work, but it's great to come home, too.

Days 3 & 4

Lot's of work is being done to complete the McKee house--even down to hanging the curtains. One more day of work and then the long trip home on Saturday. Great week; great work.

Day Two: Making Progress

Another hard day of work for the team, followed by a great dinner and a little local color.

Day One: Working Hard

The team is working on a house in Moss Point, MS, that belongs to a Mr. McKee. Susan reports that the Lord has blessed them with a much needed cool breeze. They're caulking, painting and doing trim work. Arlene stayed at Camp Hope and sewed curtains. What a team!

Team Aldersgate heads to the Gulf Coast

A team of seven people arrived in Mississippi today to begin a week long work mission to help Hurrican Katrina victims. Dave Bolyard, Barry & Mimi Goldsmith, David Pitts, Susan Phillips, Albert & Arlene White will spend the week at Camp Hope, a United Methodist camp that was built to support hurricane relief. It was a long drive from Augusta, but they enjoyed a great barbecue dinner at The Shed.

Nicaragua News

It's been an exciting week in Nicaragua. The medical team has treated 778 patients in three days and 782 people now have new reading glasses. The team has been blessed beyond description.

Day 1-Miramar

We had a great first day in the village of Miramar! The bus ride was about 40 minutes along some very rough roads, but we made it to and from with no problems (except a few cattle crossings we had to manuver around!). It was a small village, and we set up at the local school that had several classrooms and a three-stall outhouse (where plumbing was an issue, might I add; the toilets were the non-flushing kind, if you get my drift). 240 patients came through the Medical clinic and 180 got new reading glasses for a grand total of 420 visits with the doctors (and our lovely ladies in the eye glass clinic)! The Lord blessed us with some nice breezes throughout the day, and He held off the rain until we got home! We met some wonderful people in the clinics today, and hopefully were able to help alot of them fix some annoyances (such as headaches, rashes and such). Please be in prayer for the group of patients we saw today, because many of them had longer-term medical issues (such as anemia, asthma, acid reflux, etc). I must give our translators some acclaim, because without them today would have not have gone as smoothly. We are blessed with several amazing interpreters! We came back to camp to a wonderful dinner of spaghetti, and are now relaxing under the tiki hut waiting to begin our evening devotional. Can't wait to see what God has in store for tomorrow!
Much love from all of us!

We Have Arrived!

Well, here we are again in Leon, Nicaragua after a day of surprisingly easy travel. The Lord really blessed us throughout the whole day with smooth transitions, from check-in to security in ATL (which took all of probably 45 min from arrival at the airport), to no hassels once we landed in Managua. The 3 hour flight was pretty smooth, with the exception of the lightning storm we flew through on landing! That was pretty fun. We had a nice, humid 2 hour bus ride from the airport to the El Ayudante compound in Leon. After a good nights sleep we woke up to a yummy meal of delicious panqueques (pancakes!) and frutas (fruit) for breakfast. We are now waiting to go to church at a local penecostal church here in the Ruben Dario barrio, where our own Pastor John will be giving the message! God is showing up in amazing ways already here in Nicaragua, and we can't wait to see what He has in store for the rest of this week! Stay tuned for more updates!

We're taking off on Saturday!

The team is excited and ready to go! We leave from Aldersgate on Saturday at noon, drive to Atlanta and catch the flight to Managua. If you would like to see the team "take off," join us on Saturday at 11:30 AM.

Preparations

Please be in prayer for our team as they prepare for the mission to Nicaragua.

Our theme scripture for the mission is I Chronicles 16: 23-24,

Sing to the Lord, all the earth;

proclaim his salvation day after day.

Declare his glory among all the nations,

his marvelous deeds among all the peoples.

Heading to Nicaragua

Praise the Lord for all of the wonderful people at Aldersgate who came out to support us and help us pack for the upcoming trip to Nicaragua. The team of 16 people are excited and almost ready to go. We'll leave at noon on September 4th and head for Atlanta to catch the plane to Managua. Then it's a 1+ hour trip to Leon and El Ayudante. We have 3 medical doctors, 3 nurses and support staff for medical clinics, plus two team members will be fitting people for reading glasses--four days of clinics in very poor communities around Leon. Please pray for our team's safety, good health and endurance for the hard work and hot temperatures.

Nicaragua 2010

Do you have the hands to go?

Do you have the feet to serve?

Do you have the spirit to enable mission?

Join us for a Mission to Nicaragua!

When: September 4-11

Where: El Ayudante in Leon, Nicaragua (http://www.nicamissions.com/)

What: Medical and Dental mission

Who: YOU!

Contact Frank Spears for more information: 706-860-1233 or frankgspears@aol.com