Dear Friends and Family,

I am writing to tell you about my very first mission trip coming up on April 15-22, 2018 and to ask for your support. With Harbor of Hope Church and Food for the Hungry, my Mom and I are going on this six day trip to El Mirador in the Dominican Republic. The goal of Harbor’s ongoing partnership with El Mirador is to help the community gain access to clean water and sanitation, education, safe shelter, improved agricultural activities, increased access to healthcare, vocational training, and a strengthened local church.

As my first mission trip, I am both eager and anxious to see how everything will unfold. I will be sure to keep you updated throughout the next few months on how things are going.

This is where you come in! As you can imagine, a trip like this requires financial support from a number of people and I hope that you can find value in what my group will accomplish while in El Mirador. I need to raise $2,000 by February 15, 2018 and I am asking for your help to reach that goal.

You can contribute to this mission financially in two ways:

• Send a check to: Shalmai Rivera P.O. Box 382 Lowell, MA 01853. Please make your check payable to “Harbor of Hope” and write "Shalmai Rivera" on the memo line. All contributions are tax deductible.
• Donate online through Pure Charity: https://www.purecharity.com/shalmairivera-elmirador2018

I am excited to become a part of this community, learning from them and supporting them in any way that I can. Thank you for being a part of ensuring that my first mission trip is a success and for believing in me as I take this leap of faith. I look forward to sharing about it with you when I come back.

Gratefully,

Shalmai Rivera

About the Trip

11 people from the Harbor of hope community will be heading to El Mirador in the Dominican Republic in April of 2018 as the second part of Harbor's partnership with Food for the Hungry in El Mirador. To hear more from some of the team that was on the first trip in August of 2017, listen to their time sharing with their church community (http://www.harborofhope.org/media/sermons/global-sunday-el-mirador-first-service/)

About El Mirador

In October of 2016, Harbor of Hope (www.harborofhope.org) launched a 10 year commitment through Food for the Hungry (www.fh.org) to partner with the community of El Mirador, in the Dominican Republic. The community is located in a rural area about an hour north of Santo Domingo, DR. The partnership has the ultimate goal of mutual transformation, both for El Mirador and Harbor of Hope. We believe all of us are impoverished in different ways in four key areas; spiritual, social, physical, and community. We hope as a church to learn from where El Mirador is strong, and that they will learn from us where we are strong.

The community of El Mirador is a rural community, that is lush with greenery. They are a community that loves baseball, and their schedule seems to revolve around it. They are filled with great leadership who is guiding the community to develop through this partnership. God has been working through that community long before we were there, and we are excited to continue to see him work in this partnership.

About Our Partnership

The partnership is guided by the idea that El Mirador already has most of what it needs to succeed. It does not need us to do things for them. Instead, we will be there to walk alongside them and learn from them. We follow the guidance of Food for the Hungry on when the community needs anything additional to that. Food for the Hungry has many people on the ground who are there every day, and are far more effective than we are in helping the community.

Learn more about our partnership below:
Read about our partnership on our website - http://www.harborofhope.org/global/
Read a blog post from Food for the Hungry about our vision trip - https://www.fh.org/2016/10/03/massachusetts-church-finds-fit-missions/