My name is Sharon Mitchell and I recently became the new ElderCare Lead Advocate. As many of you know, Susan Schwope stepped down from the role in late August after 3 years of developing and nuturing this wonderful program. She will be missed by many!
Susan, myself and Amy Gandy worshipping with the elders in August.
I thought I would introduce myself and let you know where I see the program going over the next year or so. My husband, Dan, and I live in Dellwood with our two kids, Isaiah (12) and Siena (10). I am an interior designer, and my husband and I have been running our home staging business for over 8 years. We took our first mission trip to Haiti together in February of this year. I returned in August with the ElderCare team and knew that God would use me to help the elderly in some way. I didn't expect Susan to step down or to be asked to take her role, but know that God had this planned for me. I am so excited to have a front seat to see what God is going to do with the ElderCare program!
Over the next few months you will see a few things happening within the program. A new sponsorship binder will be at the Healing Haiti Guesthouse next week that will allow mission goers to see which elders still need to be sponsored and to send updates to sponsors of the elders they visited that week. We also have a new ElderCare Sponsorship Advocate, Cathy LeVahn who will be working hard to make sure all elders get sponsored!
We will be updating the blog sidebar and website so you can see who is part of the ElderCare team. We will also be adding pages to the website where you can meet the elders, sponsor a specific elder, purchase a talking bible and more. Look for those updates in the next few weeks. We also hope to be blogging more in between ElderCare trips so that you know what's going on.
A couple of new programs will be introduced over the next year. Jessica Burmester, our In-Country Advocate, and Shelly Manella, the Eldercare Public Relations Advocate will be working on a memoir book to capture the stories, history and wisdom that each of the elders are so willing to share. Hopefully this will be available to purchase as a fundraiser for the ElderCare program.
And lastly, I am so excited to develop a program that will help the elderly create some income. Over and over again, the elderly have asked us to help them become self sustaining. They are able and willing to work, but have nothing to get started. We will be working to provide jobs for them at Grace Village, creating jobs for them helping other elders in the program, possibly baking pizzas or bread in the new pizza oven that is being installed in two weeks and buying items wholesale that they can sell on market day.
Please keep the elders, the program and our team in your prayers. God is going to do some amazing things!!!
Sharon
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