Hope Community Church of Agawam

What involves a 23-hour flight, humid 90-degree weather, and interacting with kids who speak a language I've never heard? You guessed it - a mission trip! From August 1 - 12, I'll be traveling to Da Nang, Vietnam to support the work of Orphan Voice. This ministry serves orphans, children with special needs, and other at-risk children (visit www.orphanvoice.org for more information).  Nine people from my home church and other area churches comprise our “friendship team,” as we’ll be called in-country.

While in Vietnam, our anticipated activities include the following:

· Spending time and facilitating activities with children at the Promise House Orphanage
· Teaching practical life skills to those at the orphanage (and possibly teaching English)
· Painting and decorating rooms at the orphanage
· Interacting with children at a school for the deaf and a therapy center for those with cerebral palsy

At this point, you may be thinking, “Okay, Heather. Why Vietnam? Why a short-term mission trip?” You're in good company - I asked myself the same questions while considering this opportunity. Prayer and insight from our trip leader led me to answers like these:

· God has previously grown my faith through situations that put me outside my comfort zone.
· Telling others about the trip may lead to new opportunities for spiritual conversations.
· Our efforts won’t stop when we leave: supporting the Orphan Voice staff while we're in-country will help equip them for their continued ministry in Vietnam.
· Our purpose on the trip is to worship God and bring Him glory; cost and location are secondary factors.

So, how do you fit in to all this?  I’d love to have you as part of my support team. Most importantly, our group needs your prayers for our safety, God’s guidance, and the Holy Spirit’s involvement both during our preparation phase and in-country.

You can also be involved through contributing financially. The trip cost is $2,000 per person, the majority of which will cover airfare to and from Vietnam. Please be aware that money raised will go toward the team’s expenses as a whole, so your contribution may go toward costs for another team member. Donations made through the GoFundMe page will be channeled directly to the church's Vietnam Trip fund. 

Thank you so much for joining me in this spiritual adventure!

Heather

Dear Family and Friends,


I am writing to each of you with some exciting news! I have been blessed with the opportunity to go on a missions trip to Vietnam with a group from Hope Community Church this coming August from the 1st to the 12th.

In Vietnam, we will be working with an organization called Orphan Voice. Primarily we will be working in an orphanage and helping them with any needs they might have along with other service projects that Orphan Voice may have lined up for us.

Orphan Voice is a Christian, wholistic child development ministry devoted to orphans, children with special needs and children at risk for trafficking and sexual abuse in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. Major outreaches include orphan care, special needs therapy, deaf education, sex trafficking rescue and prevention, family preservation, and medical outreach. Their website orphanvoice.org has much more information on the great opportunities we will have to serve in. This trip will be my first ever missions trip to go on and I’m blessed to have this chance to go. The minute I heard about this missions trip I knew in my heart that I wanted to go, although there were many uncertainties leading up to making the commitment to this trip.

As part of going on this missions trip, I am looking to raise support and would love to share this opportunity with each of you. The total cost of this trip is $2,000; the majority of the trip cost is the airfare. But even more, I would appreciate your prayer support as I go on this mission trip. It goes against my natural instincts to ask people to donate financially, so I am asking each of you to consider joining me in being involved in any way you can, to see what God has in store for our group as we go out to Vietnam to serve those in need.

I am looking forward to  preparing for this trip with this amazing group of individuals, and I know that God will use this for His glory. There’s no doubt that we will grow closer to Him while He continues to strengthen our faith even facing difficult situations. 

The Bible tells us in James 1:27 “Pure and undefiled religion before our God and Father is this:  to look after the orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world”. I feel this missions trip will be a great opportunity for our group to serve according to His word.

Thank you,
Kyle

It's time.

Our beards have been untamed for too long. Our chins haven't seen the light of day since we picked up our first chainsaw at 5 years old. Hours of combing with combs that look like they were made for squirrels. Days spent battling against flaky, scraggly anti-bearded-ness, applying beard oil every waking minute. It's time to say goodbye to our food-saving, testosterone-boosting, could-probably-be-a-bird-sanctuary hair monuments that give us the comfort of knowing we can survive a grizzly bear attack with a potato peeler.  No longer can we carry on with our woman-wooing wonders of the world that we call "beards". They must go.

And why? For nothing? NO.

This Summer, an outstanding team of men and women from Hope Community Church Agawam have volunteered their time to visit Vietnam to serve with the Orphan Voice ministry.

Us beardly men wanted to help them so we gathered together and discussed it and figured, what-the-heck, if we gonna do it, we gonna do it big.

Thus was born the beard-o-meter:


So what can you do? Donate a few bucks (or a lotta bucks if you're really just looking to end it here and now) and see some gnarly beardage get shredded. Call it an ego-meter if you want, but for some of us, it's gonna hurt more than others. We're talkin' my-middle-school-dance-date-just-broke-up-with-me level of pain. But for the cause, we deem it worthy. Here we sacrifice our dignity and pride, giving up our faces to be shorn as sheep and exposing our true appearances as if they were out-of-the-womb.

Join us in this noble cause. Let's get this mission team funded and on their way to Vietnam!

Donations will directly go to Hope Community Church Agawam and be distributed to the team.

For more info go to:
http://www.hopecommunitychurchagawam.org/