Helping Others: What AOCCCI Is All About

From the very beginning I have had two purposes for moving out to the country.  I have mainly shared the first purpose—to live as self-sufficiently and sustainably as possible.  We have spent the past year mostly working on that goal. First I paid a crew to install a fence so I could start a vegetable garden.  I have grown some vegetables every summer since.  Then the goats showed up so Rick Sanchez came out to build me a goat enclosure.  Before he was even halfway finished with that job he decided to move out here too.  The goat enclosure is now completed and home to eight goats (2 does, 3 wethers, and 3 babies).  One of our two does, Bambi, is a dairy breed and so I have been milking her daily.  Unfortunately Lawn Mower developed mastitis in half her udder and rejected the second born twin.  So I have decided to wait on learning to make goat cheese and instead I am feeding Bambi’s milk to the rejected kid.
  
Now Rick is actively building a chicken coop/rabbit hutch.  The rabbit hutch half will wait to be completed, but work on the half that will be for chickens he is anxious to finish.  A friend has offered to give us a few chickens.  There are also many stores in the area selling baby chicks right now.  So as soon as the chicken coop is complete, there will be chickens on this land.  Chickens produce eggs and we love eggs.  While Rick is busy building the chicken coop, I have been busy preparing the garden for the vegetable plants and seeds I recently purchased.  And if all goes well, the fig tree I purchased and planted in a pot yesterday will be producing figs by the fall of 2014.  When I was a child my aunt had a fig tree and us kids just picked the fruit right off the tree.  I have not eaten a fig since as they cost way too much in the stores.  So it will be a joy to be able to pick a fig off the tree and indulge.
  
I have been kind of silent concerning the second goal, which has always been the primary purpose of AOCCCI, which is to help people.  Rick and I have not been doing all this work just for us, but so that people who are in danger of being homeless and in need of help, especially individuals with major health issues, can be helped both physically and spiritually.  Long before I moved to the country, I have been corresponding with such individuals.  Before the move every time I had to tell someone that land had not been purchased and so there was no place for them to come to, my heart would always ache.  I understand the fear and desperation of being too ill to work and yet not having a safe place to live.  Once there was land, the problem has been the lack of cabins for people to live in.
  
As I just said I have been corresponding with people in need for years.  Most of the time I only hear from an individual once or twice, but there have been a number of individuals where correspondence has been extensive and they came close to moving out here.  Occasionally it has been a friend or even a case worker who has been the contact person.  In such incidences the friend or case worker is looking for help for someone or a family who is on the verge of homelessness and is suffering from major health issues. Such is the case concerning a recent contact.
  
A few weeks ago we were contacted by someone aware of a family in a desperate situation.  For their privacy I will keep details confidential, but without help the father, who is currently facing major health (and other) issues, was in danger of losing custody of his children due to a lack of decent housing.  After numerous phone conversations a decision was reached to send the family here.  The contact person knew of resources that would provide money to pay for bus fare out to Texas.  Earlier this week the bus tickets were purchased and this father and his four children were put on a bus.  April 5th, Rick and I drove two vehicles to San Antonio and picked the family up and brought them back to the ranch.  It would have been wonderful if we could have moved them into a completed cabin but without volunteer help and financial contributions to help defray the costs, Rick has had to put off building the cabins.  So we brought out this family of five knowing they would have to live in the house with us. 
  
The town of Rocksprings may be small, with limited resources, but thanks to donations made long before this family’s situation was made aware to us, we were able to obtain enough mattresses and bedding for each person to have a place to sleep.  We placed the two girls in the office for privacy, and the father and his two sons are in the family room.  It is not an ideal situation but at least this family is still together with a roof over their head.
  
Please pray for this family.