Adult Mission Programs

Guatemala Team's reports from their trip: part 1

The Guatemala Mission Team Returns – Part 2

On Tuesday, July 8, eight of the PUMC Team members were able to go to the homes of several of the neediest families to deliver water filters provided by Peakland donations. These were ceramic filters that sit on the counter/table and filter water for drinking and cooking.

The trip into the homes was enlightening and instructive. How can people who have so little be happy? How can they have smiles to share when they live in homes with rocky dirt for floors and walls and roofs made of palm thatch? Chickens, dogs and a few cats freely roam about, though the pigs had stick collars that kept them from coming into the houses. Most of these homes we entered had just one room with an open cooking fire in the center, giving the thought of “central heating” a different twist. (One of the inherent concerns with that, of course, is abundant eye and respiratory problems among the population.)

Everyone appreciated the filters, which we gave out to another group of families at the school the next day. We were able to share with them that as God has blessed us, we wanted to pass that love on by sharing the possibility of clean drinking water to them and their families.

In the afternoons, the Bible School Team became a classroom cleaning team, landscape gardening group and trash patrol. The classrooms of the school had not been cleaned in many years. We left it looking organized and as clean as possible. We scoured the school area picking up trash and then created a small terraced garden of sorts with the help of several young boys who showed us how to use their huge hoes. By their skill we could tell they had helped their fathers plant the corn that is prevalent everywhere on the mountains, anywhere there is the least bit of available soil.

The last day this team stayed back in Chiquimula to assist the people of the small church that helped to feed us each day, plant a garden with lettuce , onions, cilantro, tomatoes, and beans, and an orchard of pomegranate, guava, avocado, lime and lemon trees along with several rose bushes.

It was good to see the PUMC group become a community through the week, all of us focused on the same goals….. living, working and playing together in unity. If you wonder why some of us seem sad, it is because we are processing all that happened. Indeed it seems as if a part of our hearts was left on the mountain side and we grieve a little for that. As God slowed us down from our ambitious schedule, God also gave us the richness of relationships with new brothers and sisters.

We could not have succeeded in accomplishing what we did without God’s help and the love, prayers and donations of so many of our friends and families here at Peakland and elsewhere.

Never think for a moment that you weren’t with us as part of this experience.   We profoundly thank you every one!

• The Central Virginia Medical Team completed a third trip in 2008 to Jamaica to provide eye care and general medical treatment for the people of that nation.

• UMW sponsors a COPA child (Community Partners, Inc., Bombita School Project in the Dominican Republic.)
  "If anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward" - Matthew 10:42 NIV

National Missions

• UMW has supported the Fresh Air Project, a mission program that brings children from urban cities of the Northeast for summertime visits to enjoy the "fresh air" experiences we take for granted. This year, UMW provided 20 children with new backpacks for their trips.

• Adults, teens, and whole families actively served as cooks, builders, and suppliers in Biloxi, Mississippi, after the disaster of Katrina.