Wendell and Deb's Wonderful Wandering: January 2022 SOWER Project

Wendell & Deb's Wanderings and Wondering

Welcome to Wendell and Deb's world! The very first "real" sermon I, Wendell, shared publicly was in a small Church in Maurice, Ia. That sermon used the scripture passage from John 13 where Jesus washes the feet of His disciples and demonstrates for them what I term the Servant mentality. After humbling himself in this act of love he states:

"Do you understand what I have done for you? He asked them. You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them." John 13: 12b -17 The Holy Bible, New International Version, Zondervan Bible Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI, 1996, p. 910

The concept of serving God by serving others has been the driving force behind our life of wandering the world! This blog tells the latest in our "Wanderings and Wondering" for our Lord Jesus Christ.

SERVANTS ON WHEELS EVER READY ASSIGNMENT

JANUARY 2022

Our SOWER work project this year has been at the Tucson, AZ Gospel Rescue Mission, Women's Recovery Center. The Center is a 9-to-12-month residential recovery facility for women seeking to return to a life of purpose and wholeness. Women, and sometimes their young children live in a safe environment as they go through a Christian focused life recovery program. They are mentored and taught life skills, worship together, live together and move from brokenness to wholeness.

We arrived at the Women's Recovery Center (WRC) on the 6th of January after a largely uneventful trip. Wendell was a little anxious early in the trip down (not unusual for him), just because we traded our Ford F350 for a new GMC AT4 3500 Sierra. The new truck only had 1800 miles on it when we left! It pulled our Sunnybrook 5th wheel camper nicely, and the weather was overall OK as long as we kept heading south!

We worked the past 3 weeks with another SOWER couple from Utah. Our homes on wheel, or "tiny house" as Deb refers to our camper, are parked in the parking lot of an old motel located on the famous Tucson Miracle Mile. Miricle Mile was where many of the movie stars of golden age of movies like John Wayne stayed as they filmed classic films of old. The Gospel Rescue Mission of Tucson purchased this old motel many years ago, and it now houses the WRC.

SOWERS come alongside their project hosts and do whatever is needed. Our hosts this month had mostly facility maintenance projects for us. The first days of our project we painted, cleaned and reinstalled ceiling vents for all the hallways of building 7 (classrooms, offices and dining hall). Deb and Linda then reorganized the "Linen trailer". They went through all the donated linen items, sorting, reorganizing and making new resident linen bundles of linen, towel and other linen items. Wendell and Lou spent several days installing a new door on and re-organizing the "maintenance trailer".

Deb and Linda then went through the food storage room, re-organizing and sorting the donated food items used by the Center to feed the residents and staff. Wendell and Lou spent a few days installing a new exterior door on the Transition House. The Transition House is a large home used by some of the women in their final recovery stage. They live in the house which is located just south of the recovery center on the same block while they work at their new community jobs, etc. After completing the door replacement, they spent some several days painting the closet and bathroom near the exterior door.

Wendell and Lou took an afternoon to repair several bicycles. The WRC has a number of men's, women's and children's bikes in various states of condition. They were able to swap parts from several

bikes to make a couple of functional bikes. Deb and Linda went back to painting! They were able to give the admin office areas a fresh coat of paint. Wendell and Lou spent several afternoons working to repair and replace damaged flagstone cap for the Center's front planters. Lou replaced the drapes on the Transition House French doors, after he and Wendell repaired the doors. Deb and Linda spent one morning cleaning the admin office/kitchen area.

Well that pretty much concludes our SOWER Project summary. We enjoyed worshiping with Lou and Linda several weeks at the Northminster Presbyterian Church. After worship one week we shared a brunch meal at Cheesecake Factory. Our evenings were cool with temps in the high 30's to mid 40's and the daytime temps in the high 60's to mid 70's! Much better temps here than back in Sioux Falls.

Following are some pictures showing the facility and work we accomplished the last three weeks. Thank you for sharing this journey as we felt your prayer support. We dedicate all our time and efforts to our Lord Jesus Christ. In His Name we serve!