Saturday, March 21, 2009

Mission trip to Jamaica

While in Missouri helping family, Jerry and Joyce, with their new home in Brixey, MO, we attended church services at Mansfield Christian Church in Mansfield, Missouri from May to October 2007. Sr Pastor Bruce Sneed after having several discussions about what brought us to the area asked me at the end of one Sunday service if I had a passport. I told him I did have one but not with me in Missouri. He told me that he and seven other individuals were going to Jamaica to help with an Orphanage at Beecher Town, Jamaica. Bruce in the next couple of weeks asked me if I would like to go on the mission trip to Jamaica, I told him I would like to go but would have to pray about it. We talked again in a couple of weeks and I told him I would go on the mission trip and help out with the construction needs at Beecher Town. The trip was scheduled for February, 2008.

Nina and I returned to Concho, AZ late in October 2007. I prepared to go, as our home church made available the necessary funds. Mean while Bruce was making the flight arrangements for me to meet up with him and the others at the Kansas city airport on February 2008. At the scheduled time for the trip only Bruce and myself were able to go.

I know our Heavenly Father knows all things, and this is why I was in Missouri and asked to go on the trip. Bruce would be in need of my skills from the Father to complete the construction work that was going to be done at Beecher Town. Bruce's ministry was helping the children and working on computer projects, therefore did not have the time to work on the necessary repairs, of the different buildings that was so needed.

Bruce and I met at the airport and we spent the night at a Pastors home just out side of Kansas city and we went back to the airport the next morning to continue on to Montego Bay, Jamaica.

This first picture shows us at Pastor Larry Wright and his wife home the evening I arrived at Kansas City.
Photobucket
Bruce and myself caught the plane the next morning and went on to Montego Bay, Jamaica. We arrived there about noon Jamaica time.

The next pictures are from the transport out to Ocho Rios, Jamaica. Pastor Jacques Blackwell and his wife Beverly met us to take us up to Beecher Town and the Orphanage where we would be staying while in Jamaica.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
The next pictures show the Orphanage at Beecher Town. I will be working on this building as well as a couple of schools that are associated with the Orphanage's ministry.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
The first task set before me was to build screens for the windows on the front of the Orphanage.

The next pictures show the cutting of the boards to make the frames for the screens, then the windows with the screens attached to the window frames.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
The next task was to build screens for the kitchen windows at what we would call a pre-school.

The next photo's show Pastor Jacques and myself building these frames and hanging them on the school building.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
After we finished the screens Pastor Jacques wife Beverly asked me to meet with the school marm. She needed a change to the interior door into the kitchen, and a leak in the drain in one of the bathrooms to be fixed. I modified the kitchen door so that the children could not be in the kitchen while the meals were being prepared as well as the meals could be passed out through the top section of the door to the attendant in the classroom to give to the children.

The next pictures show the progress of this work being done.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
Back at the Orphanage, Beverly as well as taking care of the children would prepare meals for us and the children at the Orphanage.

A few pictures of the interior and the children at the Orphanage.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket Here are some pictures of Pastor Bruce ministering to the children at Beecher Town and at the schools.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketWednesday afternoon we went down to Ocho Rios for an evangelism meeting at the Christian church. A few photo's of the evening.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
The next task for me was up at what we would call a combination junior and senior high school. There was a long open hallway that they wanted closed off at both ends with doors. They had two doors in the building that they did not use and wanted them modified for this use. Interesting, but not exactly impossible to do. The pictures below explain this interesting project.
Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket
On Sunday we attended services at the Beecher Town Christian Church. A few pictures of the celebration.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
The last task they had for me was the boys bathroom at the Jr. Sr. high school. Which was a little room on the outside of the school's main building. Someone had kicked in the bottom of the door and stole the fixtures out of the bathroom. I only had the afternoon to complete this project before we left for the states the next morning.

A few pictures of this project below.
Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Next a few pictures of the town, which is at the top of a hill. Some pictures overlooking to the ocean, and some of the drive down to Ocho Rios, Jamaica where we caught the bus back to Montego Bay to catch our flight.
PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket
It was a great blessing for me to see the appreciation of these people for the many projects that could be completed. There was so much that needed to be done. I wish there had been more time or men to help with the many projects of this Orphanage's ministry.