'A most interesting trip!' 51st anniversary: An adventure in service
Rev. John and Virginia Taylor at the UMCOR Depot in Baldwin, Louisiana in celebration of their 51st wedding anniversary.
July 31, 1956, John Taylor married Virginia Carter. On July 30, 2006, Lake Cities UMC, Lake Dallas, where John serves as associate pastor, surprised the couple with a 50th Anniversary party. In lieu of gifts, guests were invited to bring school supplies to help local children or to make a donation for an adult mission trip.
A year later, June 17-21, 2007, six people joined the Taylors on an adult mission trip to the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) Depot in Baldwin, Louisiana.
The team did many different jobs. Some helped unload kits that came in from the Tennessee Annual Conference, then sorted those kits into specifics: health kits, school kits, layettes, etc. Some team members sorted through health or school kits to make sure things were exactly right so as to go through a foreign customs inspection, if necessary. Some packed sorted kits in boxes, ready to go when UMCOR needed them.
While this team from the North Texas Conference was in Louisiana, flooding rains poured on Gainesville, Sherman and other areas of the Conference. The call went out from the Conference office to UMCOR; UMCOR called the Depot; and two team members, Frank Graham and Rev. Kevin Strempke ended up driving a U-Haul load of flood buckets and health kits for flood relief. More than 200 flood buckets were delivered to Valley View UMC. Three days later, only 75 remained. "And we expect those to be gone by next week," reports VIM director Rev. Marji Bishir.
Rev. Taylor laughs, "Lake Cities Church had donated materials, so we actually took about six flood buckets with us to the Depot --- then we came back with 200!"
Staff at the UMCOR Depot could not remember before that a serving team ever had to take relief supplies home with them at the end of a mission trip.
Virginia Taylor smiled, "Well, it was a most interesting anniversary trip!.
