FRESH-HOPE .org M i n i s t r i e s I n t e r n a t i o n a l
Fresh Hope Ministries International Annual Re ort 2022 p
Also known and referred to as FHMI
Report for 1[st] January 2022 to 31[st] December 2022
Charity Commission for Northern Ireland No. : 101883
Website: fresh-Hope.org
Address: 5 Pinehill Crescent Bangor BT19 6SF
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Overview
Once again, we thank you all from the bottom of our hearts for your continuing love and support for what Fresh Hope is doing in Sierra Leone, West Africa. None of this would happen without your help.
Our focus this year covers 3 main projects.
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Church Planting is the first of our much needy projects areas this coming year. In the past year it has been impacted strongly by the economic state of the country and reduced funds available.
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The second project area is our Children and Baby Fostering programme, we call it Foster+. This area covers the children’s care in an existing family home, their education and medical needs. This mode of care is so much more effective and less costly than dedicated a orphanage. The more support for this project the more children we can help care for.
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The third project area is the Vocational Training Institute and Workshop. This has been a very successful enterprise reaching very vulnerable adults including prostitutes, those who did not go to school and other marginalised groups. The training is provided by skilled workers which we would like to offer some renumeration to. As the intake grows the Institute also needs materials to provide the training, Cloth, dye, tools, fuel for generators, raw materials etc.
Church planting contributed by Rev Alusine Massaquoi—Country Director
Church planting and Evangelism has been the centre move of the ministry. Covid is continuing to wreak havoc in the villages limiting our access to support and development of the church network.
We have trained about 300 church planters this year from Fresh Hope and other partner ministries. We have baptized over 250 new believers this year. It is through the churches that we operate the Foster+ project.
Our central pig farm also plays a vital part of the project where a set of breeding pigs are donated so the village can start its own productive farm where piglets are reared and sold to provide for the education and medical needs of the very vulnerable children.
Our annual Pastors conference in Bo, the 2nd largest city in Sierra Leone is vital to the encouragement and building up of the village pastors where they network and build connections with the supportive church planting teams. In December 2022 there will be over 600 people attending. This is a multi-denominational gathering as in the last number of years we have been assisting other churches with the training of church planting teams. We call this Catalytic Church Planting.
Depending on the size of the village we would assist with contribution to either building a church or renovating a building. It is amazing what supporting a few bags of cement, mud blocks and corrugated sheeting can do!
The main way our church planters get out to these remote villages is by motorbikes. The jungle paths are not kind to the bikes and they are in constant need of maintenance to keep the Church
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planting project in motion. Support for this project helps to keep all this running and enable expansion of the team to reach more poverty-stricken remote villages.
Foster Plus Families information contributed by Rev Alusine Massaquoi—Country Director The Church is the backbone and platform that all of our social outreach ministries are based on.Over the last 22 years being involved in ministry we have had several orphanages as that seemed to solve the immediate need of dealing with so many orphans especially after Sierra Leones 11 year civil war.
Orphanages are now frowned on by many governments. Our Baby Rescue Centre was a bit special, even regarded highly by the local government in that motherless babies had nowhere else to go. We have evolved our orphan and baby care in a much better care model that even other churches are picking up on.
We asked our congregation member families to prayerfully consider fostering a child into their existing home. Fostering is a natural concept that Sierra Leonians have understood for decades as in a village if a mother died a relative or close friends would try and take in the orphan.
The Fresh Hope Church assesses families and gives them suitable training and special pastoral care/monitoring to enable them to take on a new member of their family. This is mentally much better for the child as they become an integrated part of a family with all its God ordained benefits with a firm foundational sense of belonging.
From a support perspective this also takes much less intervention to maintain a good quality level of care. To that end we will be opening a special dedicated support fund that anyone can give into that goes towards the needs of the kids in foster care. As most families in Sierra Leone do not have surplus income we try and help the foster families as the fund allows. This fund supports the kids education, the clothing, bedding and medical care.
Technical and Vocational Training Institute
contributed by Rev Alusine Massaquoi—Country Director
Almost since Fresh Hopes inception around 20 years ago now, we have had some sort of vocational training to enable the disadvantaged and vulnerable to gain a skill that they could practice to avoid either a life of crime or prostitution. Over those years we have learned many lessons, some of them the hard way.
After the students finished their training in the past we gave them a starter pack of a bolt of cloth, tailoring equipment, a loom, or a sewing machine. During their training they had a great sense of community and could minister and support each other as well as receiving pastoral care from the church. What we found was that once qualified where they went back to their local community, we would lose track of the students and the equipment and machines don’t get maintained and fall out of use.
Our current model is that as well as equipped training classrooms kitted out with sewing machines where they learn the skill, we also have a separate Workshop building also kitted out with sewing machines where they come post-training to work. They produce dresses and shirts for their own
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clients and pay a small charge for the use and maintenance of the equipment. Here they maintain their sense of community and pastorally the church can minister and counsel them as they settle into a new lifestyle. Most of them have become church members. As we only have to buy the machines once we can better use any support we get for this project. We can also maintain the machines in good working order.
The institute has four components: tailoring, catering, hair dressing and Electrical Installation. The computer school also serves as part of the institution.
One of the challenges we have is getting skilled trainers to commit to enough time to provide consistent level of training for the students. We cannot charge the students as the poverty level if so high therefore we would like to offer the trainers a token remuneration for their teaching time.
It is one of the biggest demands on our finances as materials need purchased for the students to practice on during their training and we still like to reward them at the end of their training with a bolt of cloth, tape measures, needles, thread and of course dress makers scissors.
Income and expenditure
Our Total income for the year was £20,856. Admin costs amounted to £402. Admin costs are slightly higher than previous due to HSBC Bank now charging higher fees for Charity accounts. The total amount going out to the work on the ground in Sierra Leone was £25,600 GBP with a balance carried forward of £1573
We are especially thankful for the ongoing support of dedicated supporters both monthly and one of givers.
Accepted by the Trustees on 30[th] October 2023 who have regard to the Commissions Public benefit requirement statutory guidance.
Andrea Peterson
Audrey Thompson
Barbara Craig
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Governing Documents
The charity is an unincorporated body founded by a Declaration of Trust by Deed in in November 2003 as Good Shepherd Ministries and amendment by Indenture in 28th February 2006 to Fresh Hope Ministries International.
The ’Objects’ of the original Deed are stated as:
To advance the Christian faith in Northern Ireland and elsewhere by:-
(a) Holding Church services and public meetings for praise, worship, bible teaching. prayer, healing and fellowship;
- (b) Providing activities, education and teaching for children and young people
Providing other social amenities and activities which are in sympathy with the other aims and objects of this Trust Deed
- (d) Radio and television broadcasting;
(e) The recording of audio and audio-visual material and production and distribution of Christian literature and audio and audio-visual material:
- (f) The support and encouragement of the Christian Church at home and overseas;
(g) Other activities incidental or conducive to the attainment and advancement of the said objects;
(h) Such other charitable acts and things as will (or will tend to) promote or encourage the Christian faith.
Trustees
Andrea Peterson Audrey Thompson Barbara Craig
Only the existing trustees may choose to appoint other trustees from time to time on an unanimous basis.