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Gospel sing to help fund mission trip
Candace Willis and Kirstin Irvine sing
Candace Willis and Kirstin Irvine sing You Light Up the Sky at last weeks gospel sing in Ludowici. - photo by Photo by Mike Riddle

A gospel sing last week at First Baptist Church in Ludowici raised money to send members of the Long County Fellowship of Christian Athletes to the Dominican Republic on a mission trip.  
Jennifer Smith, Isaac Gaither, Diane Anderson, Ciara Wine, Justin Gordon, Candace Willis, Kirstin Irvine and the group Doxology performed.
In addition to singing, students who have gone on the trip in the past shared their testimony. Harley Dawson, who attended last year, said that one of the best parts of the stay was sharing God’s message with children.  
“They just want to touch you and hold you and be a part of you the whole time you’re with them,” she said.
Dawson said that she accepted Christ during last year’s trip — after she realized how much Americans take for granted.
“We take everything for granted here. Down there, they live by the moment. They live every day as if it is the last thing that they’ll ever do,” Dawson said.
Kelsey Higgason said her cousin attended the trip last year, and after seeing the difference it made in her life, she is excited about attending herself.
“I believe that God planned for me to go this year,” Higgason said. “Atlanta is probably the biggest place I’ve ever been. Now, I’m going to another country, and I know that God can use me to touch other people’s lives.”
David Simmons, one of the night’s performers, told the youth of how he was raised in church, but after he became a man, he left it and did many things that he wasn’t proud of.
“After I turned 18, I got out with folks I shouldn’t have been with, and I thought I couldn’t come back,” he said. “But God brought me back, and at 28 years old, I got saved.”
Eric Sizemore went on the trip last year as a chaperone and is going back again this year.
“God has opened the door for me to serve locally and also to serve on a foreign mission, and I just want Him to break me for His work,” he said.
Paul Austin, this year’s trip coordinator, said that after the students came home last year, they were on fire for the Lord, and they have changed Long County since their return.
“We went on a mission trip to another country, but that trip changed our community for Jesus … you don’t have to go to another country to be a missionary, tell Jesus yes and let Him use your for whatever mission He has for you,” Austin said.

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