Just got a wonderful and helpful email from Barry Morgan, director of Acres of Hope. I will cut and paste part of it in order to paint for you the best picture of the situation I'm trying to mobilize help for. (That wasn't a very good sentence, but ---). Whatever he said in terms of thanks I forward with the same sentiments to you who are helping! I have highlighted for you if you need to skim.
Thank you so much for your faithful servant’s heart, your compassionate generosity and your swift and effective actions on behalf of the Kingdom during this crisis in Florida.
My wife, Lynne, has reviewed your wonderful blog and the new clothing and personal items you are so wisely requesting are exactly what is needed. We cannot receive used clothing items, as we do not have the extra volunteer resources or facilities to sort, launder or dispose of the unusable items. The costs we would pay in disposal fees for unusable clothing far exceeds any benefit received.
Other relief ministries and agencies are able to move into a residential area and set up a base of operations and have hundreds of families come to them to distribute needed items. At Acres Of Hope America we must travel, often long distances to locate the small farm families and remote rural residents before we are able to deliver help. Therefore, the needs of our relief ministry are uniquely different from general public requirements because the disaster needs of small farmers are different. Once we provide any essential food, water, clothing and personal items we then try to aid them with critical farm needs to get their farms secure and functioning again. This and the travel costs make our relief efforts much more costly.
Beyond meeting essential human needs, the small farmers often have critical needs for their livestock. Fencing, feed, seeds, feeders, fertilizer and small equipment have been blown away or destroyed. In addition, there are storm related veterinary costs, and animal transport costs to get the animals to safer pasture and return them back to the farms when conditions permit. We also try to meet the essential personal needs of any remotely rural families that we encounter while serving small farm families.
Zoanna, as I am sure your dear mother growing up on a farm in KS can attest to, small farmers, by their very nature, usually place a higher priority on the well being of their animals and crops than they do for their own comforts. Therefore, any critical farm related items that we are able to provide small gifts of money for the repair or replacement costs, mean so much to them in their survival to continue farming.
Now, that the search and rescue efforts have been completed, we are more freely permited to travel throughout the affected areas. From the estimates we are now developing we estimate that we may have as many as two hundred small farm and rural families that need assistance with clothing and personal items. This early in the crisis we do not yet have any estimates on critical farm related needs. We are also raising funds to replace and distribute Bibles.
Zoanna, since Acres Of Hope America does not usually function as a disaster relief ministry we do not have the very large sums of financial resources, nor do we receive any governmental funding, that disaster relief requires, especially for the critical unique needs of small farm familes. Therefore, financial gifts no matter how small the amount, are so very crucial to support our efforts in service to our Lord Jesus Christ. Your great blessings along with your Christian friends, of your prayers and the new essential items you are so generously shipping, will mean so very much to these desperate and grateful small farm and rural families who are going unknown and unreachable by most other relief providers.God bless you, from the deepest part of our hearts we thank you, your precious mother and your dear Christian friends for all of what you are so lovingly doing for others in service to Jesus Christ. Barry
Stewards In His Service For His Glory
Barry L. Morgan
Acres Of Hope America
8701 Blind Pass Road, 307B
St. Pete Beach, FL 33706
10 comments:
Hey, Zo -
Do you have a paypal account? Email me if you do and maybe we can forward some money toward your shipping costs.
Jessica
good idea...please post if there's a way for non-locals to help.
Zoanna, we are going to send money directly to Barry at his address. I was impressed about how they treat their farm animals, how they need food for them and transportation costs so I will ask that they money we send goes towards that. Thanks for this, it was great. It's really good for us to think outside and look to others needs.
Jessica, Amy, Beth, and others--I hope you got to read the comment I posted here. I deleted it this evening since I don't want my email addy up there too long. If you need it again, let me know and I'll put it up fast. The email addy and paypal acct are identical, by the way.
Thanks again for helping. Really, really apprecite being associated with such quickly responsive, big-hearted people. (Not that you aren't if you didn't reply to this call for help. "Don't hear what I'm not saying."):)
I do wish that you'll get as much help as possible around you. You are so involved in caring for others. I pray that God multiplies all what you and your friends are giving, with many blessings for you and others.
Since I won't have time to get buy and then get items to you, I'll talk to Josh about donating to them directly. Thanks for posting this letter, Zoanna, and orchestrating all of this!
What a great thing Zoanna. Way to be VERY active! I am going to talk with Justin tonight too about sending money. It is fine to send it directly to Barry?
Thank you, Anne. Yes, that's what I reocmmend, making your ck out to Acres of Hope America and send it to the address on the screen.
STay tuned for pictures, everyone. For you to get a visual of this project that you're donating to and/or praying about, I'll post some pictures soon. It's such a Five loaves/two fishes testimony. You wouldn't believe how so little goes so far!
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