Last year, I had the opportunity to attend a disaster simulation where newbies can get a taste and consider getting trained further. We experienced a hurricane in the a.m. and a tornado in the afternoon. What was new for me, having followed up both of those kinds of disasters, was being part of the second wave of responders that does assessments (we usually arrive during the relief phase, addressing what was already assessed) and finding injured actors from the tornado. When we found injured people in the woods, we would report by radio to the Georgia Army National Guard on site. HRM does this because ongoing home repair is complimentary to disaster response. We find that it is easier for churches to respond to a critical need if they have a home repair team organized.

This response has spiritual application because we’re usually helping people that 1) either don’t have insurance, or 2) need to cover up until insurance adjusters arrive. We are often their only option for help. God wants us to approach Him with the same attitude as those picking up from a disaster - broken, helpless and looking for a savior and helper. And God, being rich in love and mercy, responds not because we are entitled or have accomplished something, but always by His mercy and grace. In Him we find salvation and grace to endure the hardships of a fallen world. We pray that people will see God’s grace in our help and embrace eternal life in Jesus Christ.

Since the gospel has freed us and heaven is ahead let’s serve Him with all we’ve got and bring a little taste of heaven to earth!

Suggestions for a Local Short-Term Home Repair Mission Trip

So how do you start looking for your short-term mission trip opportunity? Here are some ideas to get you started:

• Contact your local or county senior services agency volunteers coordinator to see what they know needs volunteers.

• Contact Dept. of Family and Children’s Services (or whatever it is called near you) to see whether they know of a low-income family fostering children and in need of home repair help. This is especially needed where there are teens being fostered.

• Contact agencies that help people with disabilities to see if they can direct you to a need.

• Are there single mothers in your church network (members and their extended families and neighbors) whose homes need attention but cannot pay for maintenance?

• Has there been a localized disaster, e.g. a flood or tornado that swept through a neighborhood (though it may not officially be a declared emergency, see how those in the path feel about it)? Contact your county or state Emergency Management Agency to see whom to contact about helping.

• Inner-city/low-income neighborhood church leaders often know of someone in their congregation who needs help. Use the opportunity to serve alongside other Christ-followers.

• Make sure that you have a waiver to cover accidents and your team. Also, make sure that your team members are insured!

So How Do I Start a Home Repairs Team?

Now that you’ve got a project, how do you start a team and what do you need? We’ve created a website – www.homerepairs.org – where we have collected the resources that can help you start up your own home repairs ministry at your church. You’ll find articles and forms that will take you through all phases of starting and running a ministry, a blog with posts from the front-lines of the ministry, a forum to ask and answer your tough questions (coming soon) and a list of churches by area to help you partner with other like-minded Christians. Sign up today and get your short term mission or youth trip ready for the summer!

In June, we are travelling to the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) General Assembly, this year in Louisville, Kentucky, to promote the ministry and network with church leaders. On this trip, we will also be co-sponsoring a mercy ministry project called “Sheds of Hope”, in Henryville, Indiana, 35 miles north of Louisville to help those whose lives were turned upside-down by a tornado this spring.  When your house is terribly damaged or gone, you need a place to put your “stuff”. Sheds of Hope are inexpensive units that can be built on-site or constructed off-site and transported to a disaster area where most needed. And most importantly, they come with the hope-filled message of the Gospel.

We will be partnering with the PCA’s Mission to North America ministry. The often overwhelming needs of those caught in disaster/emergency situations provides the need for a partnership between MNA’s Disaster Response ministry and churches with home repairs/disaster response teams ready to deploy. Our ministry provides materials to help churches start those teams and help them begin serving the community. At the General Assembly, we hope to show PCA leaders the benefits to starting their own church teams and have them take information back to interested people in their congregations. Starting such a team provides several things for a church:

• A way for the church to serve its own widows and others who own homes and are not able to afford a contractor to make repairs or make the repairs themselves
• A mechanism to respond to situations where people in the community are begging Christians to come to their homes to help (an opportunity for the church to offer temporal, as well as eternal, help as they “love their neighbor as themselves” in deed and Word)
• An opportunity to engage handy men and women from their congregation who can find themselves somewhat marginalized, relative to church-based ministry, because they don’t sing in the choir, keep the nursery, or teach Sunday school
• The opportunity for Christ-centered churches to serve together and represent Christ as one body to their communities
• Connection and unity at a grassroots level for a denominations’ churches within a city or community as church teams join together for larger projects
• The mechanism for churches to respond to disasters and be the love of Christ to the devastated, as they respond to calls for help from organizations such as MNA and others.

Our website provides the information that churches need to start teams – they’ll find a library of information about starting and operating a home repairs team. There is currently a Blog, and we’ll be launching a Forum where questions can be asked and answers provided by experienced people.

So, who do you call on if you want to start a team? In conversations we have had with church leaders, the question we ask is, “Who is the person you would call when one of your widows needs something repaired?”  That is potentially the person who needs to be challenged with engaging others and if not him, probably knows who might have such an interest.  Two guys, a bag of tools, and an SUV can constitute a home repairs team.  That’s a disaster response team that can grow as the Lord provides vision and skills.