Volunteers from across the country come together through Eight Days of Hope

JACKSON, Miss. (WCBI) – Volunteers with a Northeast Mississippi based ministry have helped homeowners of recent record rainfall in Jackson.

For several days on the Jackson relief trip, Gale Manning was busy assessing flood damage to homes and filling out paperwork.

Another day, he maneuvered a Bobcat, helping clear debris from a yard.

“God has put it on my heart to go out and serve people and this is the way I want to serve people now,” said Manning, who has retired from the U.S. Marshal’s Service and was a part time investigator with the Union County Sheriff’s Department.

He has been volunteering with Eight Days of Hope since 2016 and enjoyed helping people whose lives have been turned upside down by a natural disaster, like the recent floods in Jackson.

“Once you get there , you pray with them, we always pray with the family members if they are there, if not, we circle up and pray as volunteers for safety and for the family. When you get ready to leave they got a smile on their face, they know there’s light at the end of the tunnel,” said Manning.

Volunteers heard about Eight Days of Hope many different ways, some through Christian radio, others through their churches and one law enforcement officer from Pennsylvania heard about a group of folks coming to his town to help after a flood and he was skeptical.

“I didn’t know if they were a bunch of scam artists, or no idea who they were, looked good on the internet, we spent some time with them and fell in love with the people, the organization, so now we are doing mission trips, this is our fifth trip,” said Fred Westover.

Once Westover retires in a year and a half, he and his wife plan to volunteer full time with Eight Days of Hope.

Volunteers don’t have to have any special abilities, just availability.

“They need somebody to talk to, it’s so much, a lot of times it’s all built up in them, just yesterday our homeowner came in and she had so much of it built up from the storm and she let it all out and she felt so much peace since she let is out and we praised God together with her,” said Johanna Lonngren, who made the trip to volunteer in Jackson from her home in Rhode Island.

Eight Days of Hope volunteers come from all walks of life and different parts of the country, but they all enjoy sharing their Christian faith with others through word and deed.

Eight Days of Hope will work in the Jackson area on flood damaged homes through March 7.