“MISSION ON 4TH ST”
HULL MISSION HOUSE
In September
of ’08 we were asked to look at Nicolas and Yolanda Del Angel’s house at 1312 4th
St in Hull, IA to see if it could be remodeled to make the upstairs accessible
and safe to inhabit.
When I got
there what I found was a home which was a 1000 sq. ft. one bedroom room main
floor and 200 sq. ft. upstairs divided into two bedrooms that was almost inaccessible
as the stairs was almost straight up and once I got up there the floor was
quite unstable. The other thing I found
was a husband and wife with their 9 children and 1 on the way that lived in
this “tiny cottage”.
I spent some
time visiting with this family and I found out that every night they would roll
their bedding out on the floor of the living room and bedroom of the main floor
to sleep and in the morning they would pick it all up and put it away. I discovered that the family loves the Lord
and that they have been praying for some time that God would provide them with
a sufficient home. Another thing I
learned was that they weren’t some “dead beat” people living on welfare but
that Nicolas, the husband/dad was a very hard working man who has had the same
job for the last 10 years and also did part time mechanic work to make ends
meet.
I then
looked at the house to see what or how we could not only make the existing
structure inhabitable but also to somehow add on to get more space for this
family to live in. After looking it over
and doing some measuring I went home to work with Julie on some rough drafts of
what we could do that would be the most practical.
After
drawing up a plan we came up with a house that would have 5 bedrooms which we
originally figured it would take about $25,000 to complete this project. We took the plan to the local body of Christ
that we know and presented the vision…..this project would have to be done in
total faith. The Del Angel family had no
resources to financially participate and we have no funding in place to do
service work to this magnitude. After
covering it with prayer the Lord said “if you go forth in faith I will
provide.”
As we dug in
and started to gut out the old house we found that the more we dug, the worse
it looked. The roof had to go, the floor
had to go, we had no idea what the foundation was like, the electrical was bad,
the plumbing was shot, the HVAC needed to be replaced……what’s left?
We decided
to stop and pray and seek the will of the Father. Once again I heard Him say, “I AM a big
God…….if you have faith, I will provide.”
So back to
the drawing board………….new plans, new house.
So now we have a plan for an 8 bedroom, 2 ½ bath home with a spacious
living area. The cost of the project is
approximately $55,000. This may sound
impossible but to date this project is over half over and every time we come to
the end of one stage of the project, enough money comes for the next
stage……..it has been the most amazing service project I have ever been on. God said, “I AM a big God……..if you have
faith, I will provide.”
If you want
to participate either financially or by volunteering, please contact me……you
will be blessed!!
Below is the
link to pictures of the progress of this project:
We will keep
updating them as progress develops so check back often.