Deerfield UMC works hard in missions

Since Hurricane Irene blasted her way through the eastern part of NC, our church has been greatly involved in providing support to those who have suffered losses. The first wave of support from my family came the day of the hurricane when my husband and son headed into the storm to go give mutual aid to the area of Atlantic Beach. Our kids prayed that all who were working would come home safely and that same day, on Sunday, the first team returned home. Then we had a group of men who traveled to the Outer Banks to serve two small churches that had suffered great losses. Our team had to take a two hour ferry ride just to get to Rodanthe where they were to serve. It was a lot of hard work, but much was accomplished in tearing out the old, flood soaked materials in the church up to about 4 feet from the floor. It was a great loss for two elderly congregations. We thank the Lord for the opportunity to go and serve there. Two weeks later, the next team of men and women from Deerfield went to Swan Quarter to work doing relief work helping several families remove flood soaked items from homes, and serving several families who were going through times of great need due to the tremendous loss from the storm damage to their homes. Their trip was also a great success. When we take the time to make the effort to go on a mission trip, we go with such high hopes that we are really going to be the hands of Christ and make a huge difference in the lives of the people we are serving. Then God somehow will turn the table on our expectations, and we end up taking away more than we feel like we were able to give. That is at the heart of what it means to serve. You get more than you give when you serve. To be able to figure that out I truly believe is the key to learning how to be a happy Christian. We live in a society where people what everyone else to do something for them. But because of what Christ has done for us, our whole daily orientation is to serve others in his name. When we do serve in response to what Christ has done for us, there we find the key to joy in our daily living. God puts more joy in our bucket than our bucket can hold. Praise be to God for the opportunity to have health and strength to do something for somebody in his name today.