What a weekend! We corralled close to 30 volunteers who in turn built a wood corral and rounded up a boat load of wood to fill it!
Meet Noah (first from the left in the front row) and his boy scout troop (Troop 628)! I met Noah a couple of weeks ago through a youth pastor / friend connection from Denver. Noah is a follower of Christ and was trying to fulfill the requirements to become an Eagle Scout before moving to Arizona at the end of the month. Noah and I met up and began to cast a vision for how to build a wood corral (a staging are for splitting and storing firewood to be donated to families in need in our community)
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Noah took that vision and ran with it! He rounded up over 20 volunteers who showed up Saturday and built log racks, cleared trees and brush, dug post holes, set posts, built fence and installed a gate to secure the wood.
Lots of great conversations about Jesus and his faithfulness as people asked about Reclaim and the ranch property. This troops rocks!
Meanwhile, on the other side of the ranch – these lumberjacks attacked the woods and began felling trees, skidding and cutting logs, loading trailers and hauling wood. John (middle), Dan (right) and Dana (left) all volunteer with Reclaim and Lifebridge (a food bank John runs in Bailey) to identify families in need of food and firewood in our mountain communities.
This is all part of the Forest Ag program we recently enrolled the ranch in – this program enables us to work with a professional forester to develop a plan to mitigate and protect the ranch from wildfire while at the same time creating a healthy forest. This is all part of “reclaiming” the land God has entrusted us with while “reclaiming” the hearts of men by sharing the gospel with all who come here as we work to meet tangible needs for our lost neighbors. With this corral built and regular teams coming to cut we should have upwards of 25 cords of wood to donate annually for the next 10 years!
Pray that God will already begin preparing the hearts of those who receive this wood to embrace the gospel of Jesus!
