Our church’s Chancel Choir will sing 11 familiar hymns arranged by Hal Hopson--the well-known composer and church musician from Dallas, Texas--and the audience will be encouraged to sing along. The hymn singing will be accompanied by the church’s newly renovated organ, as well as by piano, brass instruments, and hand chimes.

"Church members dressed in costume will pose as the hymn writers and tell the story of the hymns they wrote," says Arlene Crawford, director of music at the church. "People attending will hear, sing, and learn about hymns familiar to people of many faiths, such as ‘A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,’ ‘Our God, Our Help in Ages Past,’ ‘Now Thank We All Our God,’ and ‘Shall We Gather at the River?’

The hymn writers include Martin Luther, John Calvin, Isaac Watts, Bishop Ambrose, Charles Wesley, Catherine Winkworth, Robert Lowry, Fanny Crosby, John Wesley Work, Roberto Escamilla, and Sydney Carter.

Church members posing as these hymn writers are Mike Dreiss, Jeff Backus, Richard Ward, David Mullins, Kent Williams, John Drake, Frances Drake, Connie Book, Chuck Coutant, Dan Terpstra, and George Darko.

Fifty years ago, half that many people were alive in the world.

More than one billion people today are living on less than a dollar a day.

Think about that--one of every six people on the planet lives each day on about what you paid for your last bottle of spring water.

This describes the people of Armenia; those are the people this mission trip is called to serve.

The outfit that runs Jaguar Creek is Target Earth International. Their motto is: Serving the Earth; Serving the Poor.

They've got 26 worldwide mission efforts focused on the "bypassed poor"-- people living on less than a dollar a day who have been overlooked by other organizations. Armenia is one such community.

Here's what Gordon Aeschliman, president of Target Earth, told us about Jaguar Creek:

"Jaguar Creek is an attempt to create a center that protects a large piece of the rainforest endangered by ex-patriot companies; to do research there on biodiversity; and to create an educational and spiritual retreat center where we could bring in Christians to learn about God’s creation and the poor--and through that experience to make vocational or financial decisions for the benefit of the earth and the poor."

Our church has long been concerned about our stewardship of God's creation. That's one reason why Target Earth International seemed like such a good fit. Here's Gordon Aeschliman again:

"Poverty and the destruction of the environment go hand in hand.

On the one hand, people who are living without access to resources use up their immediate environment just to live, and that creates additional poverty. On the other hand, sometimes it’s the people of means who destroy the environment that the poor depend upon, and that creates poverty."

Many of the Mayans in Armenia are there because first-world corporations such as Sunkist cut down the rainforest where the Mayans had lived and used the land to grow orange plantations.

We can help make a difference in their lives.

One of the measures of environmental poverty used by the United Nations is how many hours a day a person spends collecting three things:
- drinking water,
- fuel wood for cooking,
- and clean water for laundry and other uses.

By these measures, the women of Armenia would be considered some of the poorest in the world in terms of environmental poverty because of the amount of time they spend each day filling these needs.

We're raising money through our fund-raising events to address those needs by building a community laundry facility. Those efforts could result in an extra 8 to 10 hours a week for the women of Armenia!

You may know that our Presbytery of East Tennessee is involved in the "Living Waters for the World" project to provide clean drinking water to Third-World communities. Our project in Armenia, Belize involves providing the clean water needed there.

Here’s our plan. A 300-ft deep well will be built with funding from the Belize government. We will build a new laundry facility that contains 6 laundry tubs (facing one another to facilitate socializing). We will connect the well by underground pipe to the laundry facility.

Our plan calls for piping to allow this non-drinkable water supply to later be outfitted with a Living Waters purification unit on a future mission trip.  We hope this well and laundry will be the first step in an ongoing relationship.

Imagine this:

• Your child woke up this morning with a high temperature and a sore throat so you call the doctor and make an appointment.
• You have a stubborn rash that is spreading so you make an appointment to see your doctor.

The people of Armenia, Belize, can’t do that. There is no one nearby to see and no money to go, even if the situation is dire enough to travel to the hospital.

Armenia's people need medical care. As part of this mission, Dr. Bob Dunlap and nurse practitioner Dale Hadden will provide primary care and well-child checkups.

Did you know that in Belize we can buy 1000 capsules of Amoxicillin for $110? That's 9 cents a capsule! Medicines can be much cheaper there.

The people of Armenia need simple inexpensive care. They need medicines to treat lice, intestinal parasites, ear infections, and asthma.

The cost of the medicine and equipment is small, yet the result can be life changing:
- A child suffering from anemia and slow growth can be cured by eliminating intestinal parasites.
- Sleep becomes possible because the itching of scabies has stopped.
- Children suffering from asthma can play again because they now have asthma medication, allowing them to breathe freely as they exercise.

Your support will help us buy the medicines and minor equipment we need to undertake this mission.

While we are there, we will also provide health care education, so people can learn to take better care of themselves for the long term. We will teach them about the AIDS virus, diabetes, obesity, and asthma, for example.

Help us a change a life for the better!

One of our mission opportunities in Belize will be working with the children at the King's Children's Home (KCH) in the capital of Belmopan, about 10 miles from Jaguar Creek.

KCH, which was started in 1985, is based on the Christian principles of love, compassion, and sensitivity.

Currently home to 38 kids ranging in age from 1 to 19, KCH relies on donations and a small subsidy of about $500 a month from the Belize government to cover home’s expenses of roughly $4000 a month.

Children at KCH may have been abandoned, abused, neglected, or orphaned. They all are in need of love and attention.

We’ll have a chance to provide some of that love and attention on our mission trip.

Sometimes, when a disaster strikes, the need is acute and the best way to provide support is to send money. Oak Ridge’s Tsunami Relief Festival a few weeks ago was a good example of that. But when the need is chronic, like in Belize and Armenia, it’s often more important to develop relationships face to face – to build a sense of community and commitment.

That’s often the only way to make long-term changes in attitudes, especially in OUR attitudes! And that’s what we hope to begin with in our mission trip to Belize.

We’re representatives, or ambassadors of First Presbyterian, of Oak Ridge, and of America to the village of Armenia. And when we return, we’ll be ambassadors from Armenia to Oak Ridge.

Thank you for participating in our fund-raisers and making additional donations. Thank you for being part of our mission!