Hello Friends,
We want to thank you for your support of Hearts With Hands during 2018. We are thankful for friends like you, who graciously support HWH through prayer, love, and giving. We excitedly share with you that throughout this hurricane season, we know of over 100 professions of faith for Salvation. The purpose and plan of Hearts With Hands will remain, as we enter this new year, “Proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the broken-hearted and to demonstrate the love of Jesus Christ by going to the entire world; helping with the spiritual and physical needs of those that have met poverty, natural disaster, disease, or famine.”
Hurricane Florence - The first major hurricane of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season was Hurricane Florence. On September 9th, Hearts With Hands began preparing, packing and loading trailers of supplies to travel to the eastern part of NC and to Loris, SC. On September 14th, the hurricane made landfall and by September 17th, we were on site. We had a team of 11 volunteers traveling the journey with us, while driving and hauling their personal trucks and campers. Our first stop was in Newport, NC, at Community Baptist Church. Then, we set up mobile distribution sites in New Bern and Morehead City at Carteret Community College. Partnering with our good friend and President of the college, Dr. John Hauser, was such a blessing. Thankfully, the beautiful campus did not suffer much damage and we could use their property for distribution. We then began helping thousands of families with Box of Hope food boxes, water, ice, hygiene kits, cleaning kits, and many other needed supplies. While Director, Greg Lentz, led a volunteer team assisting in NC, Field Director, Donald Jennings led a team of volunteers in Loris, SC, and Myrtle Beach, SC.
We were able to have a warehouse temporarily donated in Loris to receive donations, sort, and send out supplies into these devastated areas. In Myrtle Beach, Grand Strand Baptist Church and their church community partnered with us and worked tirelessly around the clock to deliver supplies to different areas in their county. Over the next month, we had four different distribution sites set up in North and South Carolina: Trenton, Wilmington, Loris, and Myrtle Beach. Because of your generous support, we sent 17 tractor-trailer loads and distributed countless truck-loads of essential relief supplies to those areas affected by Hurricane Florence.
Hurricane Michael - On October 13th, we began transitioning our focus at the warehouse in Asheville. We started packing and loading trailers to make the trip to Panama City, Florida with the necessary immediate resources and supplies. Hurricane Michael was a catastrophic category 4 storm, the strongest storm on record to ever hit the panhandle of Florida. By October 15th, Field Director, Donald Jennings and Lead Volunteers Ken and Jimmy had a team in place to respond to areas that were devastated by this hurricane. Over the next two months, we poured ourselves into helping folks from the Panama City Beach area to the other side of Bay County in Bayou George. In this county alone, thousands of houses, businesses, and over 100 churches were damaged or destroyed. There were schools and colleges damaged, in addition to the Tyndall Air Force Base being almost completely destroyed. There were thousands of families displaced, with nowhere to go, but to live in their cars and tents. We set up several distribution sites throughout the area at: Central Baptist, Galilean Baptist, Woodstock Church, Gulf Coast State College, and many other locations all across Bay County. We completed our distribution right before Christmas, on December 20th. We took on a big project of packing and delivering over 5,000 of our Box of Hope food boxes to displaced students in the Bay County school system. We are SO thankful for your giving, with your help Hearts With Hands was able to offer assistance to every school in Bay County! Together, we helped all 5,200 displaced students and families. This project allowed us to effectively touch the entire county with the Gospel of Jesus Christ right before Christmas.
Mission Projects International & Local - In 2018, Hearts With Hands partnered with international mission projects in Haiti, Guatemala, Dominican Republic and in Ghana, West Africa. In Ghana, we continue to give medical supplies to Wenchi Hospital. In December, we sent a container with wheelchairs, hospital beds and medical supplies. We also provided several missionaries and orphanages with school supplies and clothes. We were also able to supply Emmanuel, our friend and Missionary contact in Ghana, with furniture for his home. It is such a blessing to help globally by bettering the lives and hearts of so many people! Locally at HWH, we continued to partner with Buncombe County Schools homeless students assistance program. We provide a Box of Hope and other necessary supplies as needed. For Christmas 2018, we helped provide gifts and supplies for several families in need. We also sponsored the 4th Annual Cavalier Christmas at North Rowan High School in Spencer, NC. This event began with a presentation of the Gospel through a Christmas program presented by New Hope Baptist in Spencer. Lunch was then sponsored and provided by Calvary Baptist in Salisbury. While activities took place in the gym, the parents were able to receive gifts and door prizes for their children. We also had a Volunteer Appreciation Dinner in early January, 2019. The dinner was originally scheduled in December, but was postponed due to snow. It was a great time of fellowship and celebration for the group effort that was displayed by our great team of volunteers.
Partner with HWH -
PARTNERS - If you, your church or business are not currently a monthly and regular supporter of HWH, would you please consider what you could do each month to help us to expand to help more people?
BOX OF HOPE - We need individuals, businesses, and churches to help us with the Box of Hope project by sponsoring food boxes. 1 Box = $20 and 1 Pallet (100 boxes) = $2,000.
RISE UP CAMPAIGN - We are in the process of purchasing our current warehouse space, the 40 acre campus with a 200,000 square foot warehouse facility. We are asking 1,000 people, businesses or Churches to commit to $1,000 a year for 5 years. This gift of $5,000 will help us in the purchase of this beautiful property.
VOLUNTEER - You can Text HeartsWithHands to 97000 or visit heartswithhands.org/volunteer to receive the latest news and notifications about opportunities to serve.
THANK YOU! - I would like to personally thank you for your prayers and support of Hearts With Hands throughout 2018. We praise the Lord for over 100 people who trusted Christ as their Savior and for the thousands of individuals and families that were helped, by your prayers and support. We ask that you continue to pray with us and for us as we try to help others during disaster and despair. As a disaster relief ministry, we’ll never know the extent of our reach, and it is impossible to track in numbers, but we do know God is honored through every effort, and He is providing for those in need. So we say “Thank you” to everyone who took part, said a prayer, donated money or food, water, cleaning supplies, baby items, etc. We ask that you continue your support in the years ahead. Our team could not have rapidly responded to Hurricane Florence and Michael, on our own efforts. It took the open hands and willing hearts of hundreds of volunteers! We need the support of individuals, schools, churches, and businesses to continue. If you are a business owner, contact us to find out how you can also partner with us! Will you get involved in the work of Hearts With Hands in 2019?
In His Service,
Greg Lentz