Update from San Augustine County, Texas

This summer our youth and several adult leaders went on a mission trip to Broaddus and San Augustine, Texas, to a site hosted by Next Step Ministries. (You can learn more about that trip here and here.) Next Step Ministries staff continue to live and work in the communities they partner with year-round, so we decided to check in and see how the projects we worked on turned out.

Robyn Gauder, mission trip coordinator with Next Step, confirmed that both projects our group worked on in June were fully completed by the end of the summer. This is great news, as our groups weren’t happy to leave things undone, even though we knew other groups were coming to pick up where we left off. Nick, the site coordinator, sent her some pictures showing more progress. We are sharing them here. We were blessed to bless others!

Brother Barth’s house was an exterior project. We tore off the siding, discovered problems with the windows and fixed them, painted new siding, put up moisture barrier, and started residing the house. We weren’t able to permanently reset the windows, complete the siding, or paint.

Here is Brother Barth's house before we started:

During our work:

When we had to leave:

Brother Barth's house at the end of the summer:

Miss Stacy’s house was mostly interior work. We primed the interior and repaired a hole in the floor. Later groups finished painting and replaced the windows. We also developed a great relationship with Miss Stacy and her family.

Finished! New walls, new windows, new floor!

First Baptist Church, in Broaddus, Texas, was our host church. We also did some work painting new lines in their parking lot.

God is good!