Wow. The year 2011 has come and gone. It is so hard to imagine how quickly it has happened.  It seems like just a short time ago I was reminiscing about 2010 and how God has blessed this ministry. As we prepare to move into 2012, we look at doing even greater things for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He is allowing us to share his blessing with those who need our help. This ministry continues to be blessed beyond our expectations.

As the year 2011 began, we found this ministry in the same situation as many of our churches and brothers and sisters in Christ when it comes to the economic situation. The Board of Directors and staff of this ministry are again stepping out on faith because we believe God will supply our needs to get the job done. We have set a budget in place to guide us during this upcoming year and we are expecting God to work through our churches and people to meet this budget.

This ministry now serves 21 clients on a regular basis. From time to time we serve other seniors who find themselves in a needful situation. Due to the economic downturn, we have added five new clients since last year and now have three applications for assistance waiting to be processed. If these are added, as I believe they will be, there will be a total of 24 clients in which this ministry serves. This will be the largest number of people being served by this ministry since I became director seven years ago. This is wonderful—except for one big thing. The overall giving from our churches has not increased in this seven-year period. The amount of money now being used to help our clients is equal to our income and this leaves no room for repairs and maintenance, administration, or other things that have to be cared for.

We were tremendously blessed to have very little damage to our duplex and storage buildings from hurricane Irene. We had a little shingle damage to both buildings, but it was minor. The main damage we had was in the rear of the duplex. Two trees, that were located there, decided to topple. The result of this was the crushing of a utility building and carport and the destruction of our chain link fence around the property. God took care of Kaye Jones, who lives in the duplex, during the storm and, except for a period without electricity, she was fine. She did lose some food, but otherwise was unscathed.

We continue to be blessed with disability equipment. It is amazing how people have donated to this part of our ministry. It is a constant merry go round with much of this equipment. It goes out and is returned and it goes right back out again. This is great because it is saving our folks a lot of money from not renting or purchasing some of this equipment. I would estimate that the amount of money we are saving our folks annually would be in the neighborhood of $3,000.

We have on hand equipment such as hospital beds, wheelchairs (manual and electric), walkers, bedside commodes, shower chairs, recliner/lift chairs, walkers, canes, and crutches. Please contact us if you are in need of a disability item and if we have it you can borrow it and it will not cost you anything.

The recliner/lift chairs are one of our hottest items. I cannot keep them on hand because so many people are in need of one. We have 13 of these chairs in our inventory and all are on loan at the present. We are beginning to be in need of manual wheelchairs. The few we have on hand now are in bad shape. So many have been loaned out and have not yet returned that we are practically out of them. If you know of someone who has a recliner/lift chair and/or a manual wheelchair that they do not know what to do with, please let me know. We can definitely use them.

Another hot item is seated walkers. These are in high demand because they are so useful to those who cannot walk long distances. We only have four of this type of walker and they are always on loan. If your church or some group within your church is looking for a special project, you may want to take on purchasing the seated type walker for our inventory.

When you are not in need of such items as we have available, you may not think about how wonderful this program is. We think if you would ask Ms. Nancy Reeves of Pireway Church in the Pee Dee Association if this part of our program is beneficial, we believe she would shout, “yes!” We were able to supply Sister Reeves with an electric wheelchair. Her pastor told me that during their revival she rode that chair to church every night. She lives not too far from the church, but this chair made it possible for her to attend.

We do not purchase any equipment we have in our inventory, but repairs have to be done and when we have to purchase batteries for the wheelchairs the cost is about $200 for each chair. We deliver equipment items if necessary and this year alone we have traveled to Bladenboro, Tabor City, Greensboro, and Elizabeth City as well as many places closer to Ayden.

We covet your prayers and continued support for this ministry. We are asking pastors, Woman’s Auxiliary presidents, Layman’s League presidents, and other groups please invite Retirement Homes to come to your church or meeting to tell you all about the wonderful things the ministry has to offer our people.

Please remember that January is Retirement Homes month and the 15th is Retirement Homes Sunday. If your church could take up a special offering that Sunday it would be appreciated, and if your church doesn’t have us in their budget, please work to get us there.