news article
Why I am grateful for VIM work
April 21, 2020 / By Janet Huston, Schenectady First UMC
Editor’s Note: The Spring 2020 issue of the Advocate will be available electronically in May 2020. The issue will focus on mission work. Mission work has been an enriching part of many peoples’ lives across Upper New York. Below, you will be able to delve into Janet and Peter Huston’s experience with mission work that spans over 50 years.
I am very grateful for the United Methodist Volunteers in Mission program. Through it, our lives have been greatly enriched and, hopefully, we have been able to improve the lives of others.
When my husband, Peter, and I were first married, we lived in Boston and Whitman, MA. We did some local volunteering there. When we moved to the Schenectady area in 1965, we chose First United Methodist Church (FUMC) of Schenectady because of the church’s concerns about and involvement with social justice. We volunteered locally through the church and community organizations.
Then in the 1977-78 school year we had a very special opportunity! Rev. Randy Nugent from the Board of National Missions spoke at our church about the need for volunteers. Our family was able to spend a year at the Navajo Methodist Mission School (NMMS) in Farmington, NM. Pete taught math and coached, and I was a school nurse. Together we were the senior high boys’ dorm counselors. Our two older children were in 7th and 9th grades at NMMS; the younger two attended Farmington’s public elementary school. Although there were some difficult times, overall it was a wonderful year in which we learned about Navajo culture, learned to love NM, and made some lifelong friends.
When we returned home, we resumed our previous activities. Pete taught math and coached at Scotia-Glenville High School. I worked at Schenectady City and County Health Departments and at Hospice of Schenectady. Our children returned to public schools. We continued to volunteer locally.
Then in 1992 our pastor, Rev. Leon Adkins Jr., and his wife, Bonnie Totten Adkins, took us on a volunteer team to Nicaragua. We were hooked! In 1998, Pete volunteered during the ice storm in northern NY. In May, 1999, the Board of Global Missions subsidized an intense week in Bolivia for health care workers. Leaders from the southern hemisphere taught us about appropriate health care in developing countries.
Later that year ,we were part of an FUMC team to Nicaragua. This was the second of a total of nine trips to Nicaragua, the second poorest country in this hemisphere. (Haiti is first.). On some of these trips, our host was CEPAD, an ecumenical Protestant organization that focuses on community development. On other trips we worked with Acción Médica Cristiana (Christian Medical Action). This group provides basic health care and education to the poorest parts of the country starting with good water and latrines. Our church now has a covenant relationship with Dr. Belinda Forbes, a UM missionary dentist who works with AMC. On some trips both agencies worked together to help us with coordination and translation. We went wherever these agencies decided we would be most useful (and where the roads were passable). Usually part of the team did health care and education while the other part of the team worked on construction.
In 2002, Lee Adkins gave us another challenge/opportunity -- Pete and I became coordinators of Troy Conference VIM. Because Troy Conference had covenant relationships with Brazil and Mozambique, we joined conference teams to both of those countries. Our other foreign experiences were Primetimers trips to Northern Ireland and Italy.
Interspersed with our international trips were domestic experiences. In Iowa, Mississippi, North Carolina, Alabama, and Texas we helped with disaster recovery. Pete worked in the Mohawk Valley and Schoharie Valley of New York after floods. We were members of other domestic teams working in non-disaster situations. Our teams rebuilt a porch for an elderly widow in the Oklahoma Conference, rebuilt a ramp on the Hogansburg, NY, UMC, and built a storage facility for sports equipment at McCurdy School in Española, NM.
In 2010, the Troy Conference was dissolved and our area became part of Upper NY Annual Conference. Pete and I both joined the Upper NY VIM steering committee. After Pete’s death in 2016, I remained on that committee and continue to value the experiences and friendships of Volunteers in Mission. I have assisted our youth group at FUMC with planning their trips and was able to be part of an intergenerational team from our church to Mission Central in Mechanicsburg, PA. In early March of 2020 I was part of a Primetimers Immigration Immersion team in Tucson, AZ, where we learned a great deal about immigration on our southern border.
I was asked to write about our early local volunteering and how it expanded. I have listed our many activities. What I have not included are the reasons for finding these experiences so meaningful. Greg Forrester once said, ”The project is not the project; the project is the people.” The people include both our fellow team members and those we are trying to serve. VIM teams often ask each other at the end of a day “Where have you seen God today?” It is always in the people with whom we are working. In most situations we work WITH local people and form meaningful relationships with them. Language differences can be overcome with translators and smiles. Sometimes we share humor. Sometimes we share worship services, hymns, and prayers. Sometimes they teach us things like how to build without electricity, how to make tortillas, what the inside of a cacao bean looks like. Sometimes our money enables a new building or some clinic days. Sometimes our primary contributions are hope, friendship, and love.
The United Methodist Volunteers in Mission motto is “Christian Love in Action.” Sharing volunteer experiences, which are sometimes difficult, leads to lifelong friendships with team members. Although most relationships with those we serve rarely continue physically because of distance and economic factors, the memories of their situations and friendships last forever.
We as volunteers are guests wherever we go. We learn about cultures, poverty, strengths, hospitality, and faith. When we come home, we try to share our experiences and to help others become more aware of and sensitive to the lives of people in other situations. It is my hope that many others will be able to experience the rewards of “Christian Love in Action” either as volunteers, enablers of volunteers, or recipients of volunteer projects.