Minister to carry cross to raise funds
The Rev. Ken Walls will once again carry a cross from one end of Fayette County to another this Lenten season to encourage people to recall the Passion of Christ and to raise funds for mission work. “We’re carrying the cross to send a message to all of Fayette County of what Easter is about,’ said Rev. Walls of Fairchance. “We don’t use a church name or Bible verse. The cross is the message. We’re reaching people seven days before Easter because that’s what the cross is about.’
Rev. Walls and members of SonLight Missions of Smithfield will undertake the 39-mile journey April 11-12, walking across Fayette County along Route 119 from the West Virginia border to the Westmoreland County border. The Rev. Wayne Whoolery, pastor of Shoaf and Little Brownfield Free Methodist Churches, will also participate.
Besides the Gospel message, the trip hopes to encourage people to donate funds to SonLight Missions for a project in San Luis, Mexico, located south of Yuma, Ariz. Local people will participate in two mission trips to San Luis this year to build a home for teen-age boys who are forced to leave a local orphanage once they become teen-agers.
Rev. Walls noted, “If extended family doesn’t pick them up or they aren’t adopted out, they are left on the streets.’
This is the third time that Rev. Walls, a former pastor and now a full-time evangelist, has carried a 10-foot tall, 50-pound wooden cross through Fayette County.
He made his first trip in 1998, taking the same route he plans to follow this year from the West Virginia border to the Westmoreland County border. This was seen as a one-time event.
But Rev. Walls made another trip in 2000, traveling from Washington County to Somerset County along Route 40. He traveled from the Monongahela River to the Youghiogheny River.
Both those trips were made in April. In 2000, Rev. Walls also made a smaller journey through Uniontown the day before Easter Sunday as he raised funds for the American Cancer Society in a tribute to a friend who died a few months earlier from cancer. The project was known as the Tom Martoncik Cross Walk for Cancer. It honored Martoncik, who was executive director of the Fayette County Housing Authority at the time of his death, and had previously worked at Uniontown Hospital, where his duties included being director of Social Services and general manager of the hospital’s high-rise apartment buildings for the elderly.
This time, Rev. Walls hopes the cross walk will encourage local residents to donate to SonLight Missions, which formed in 2001 and became a non-profit corporation in February 2002. SonLight recruits local residents to volunteer on mission trips and raises funds for mission projects. Rev. Walls is vice president of SonLight.
In 2001 and 2002, the missionaries built homes for San Luis families. In 2001, 11 people participated on a mission trip. Last year, 31 people went, allowing the missionaries to host a Bible school, visit a drug rehabilitation clinic and prisons, minister to people who lived at a garbage dump and host worship services.
This year, SonLight is planning three mission trips: to San Luis in May and July and to Venezuela in August.
Norm Berkshire, secretary of SonLight, started his mission work with two trips to Venezuela in 1997. Berkshire is one of the SonLight Missions members who will accompany Rev. Walls on this year’s cross walk. He noted the missionaries would help complete construction on a church in Maturin, Venezuela.
SonLight Missions’ other officers include Heath Berkshire (Berkshire’s son) of Reynoldsburg near Columbus, Ohio, as president, and Barb Albright of Fairchance as treasurer.
The board of directors includes George McLaughlin of Morgantown, Kevin Schaeffer of Ohiopyle and Pat Coburn of Uniontown.
Approximately 80 local residents will participate in SonLight Missions’ 2003 trips. They will come from a variety of churches, including Connellsville Church of God, Uniontown Free Methodist, White House Free Methodist, First Baptist of Fairchance, Faith Assembly of God in Uniontown, Abundant Life Church of Uniontown, Bethany Presbyterian Church of Belle Vernon, Pricedale Unionville Church and Greater Works Outreach in Monroeville.
Berkshire noted there are still three spaces available in May as well as 10 spaces available for each of the other trips. People of all ages participate. Anyone 18 and younger must have their parents’ permission and someone to be responsible for them.
“Anyone who wants to go with us pays $500 to cover their expenses and donates a week of their life,’ said Rev. Walls.
SonLight Missions has also agreed to donate $25,000 toward the building of the boys’ home in San Luis that is estimated to cost $200,000. The boys will be able to stay until they are 18 and can be educated at an adjacent trade school. A couple from South Carolina is moving to Mexico to oversee the home. SonLight Missions works with Caring Hearts ministry, which is overseeing projects in San Luis. Heath Berkshire is also on the board for Caring Hearts, helping with adoption services.
SonLight members have been busy garnering support from local churches and hosting fund-raisers for the $25,000 for the boys’ home. Berkshire and Rev. Walls both said that Fayette County people have been very generous in their support.
In line with this, Rev. Walls wants to speak out to the children of Fayette County to donate funds through the cross walk. All funds raised go directly to the building project.
“With a population of 150,000, there has got to be 30,000 kids in Fayette County,’ said Rev. Walls. “We want to say to the kids, would you give $1 to the children of San Luis? We’re asking every child in Fayette County to give a dollar.’
As to the question of why give to Mexico when there are needs in Fayette County, Rev. Walls replied, “There are needs in Fayette County and we want to be involved here, too. But the need by comparison in San Luis is incredible. They don’t have government programs like Fayette County. You have people there making $5 a day. The first home we built was for a family of six where the father – a good, Christian man – worked six days a week for $5 a day. There is no mortgage money in Mexico. It takes the average family in San Luis 63 years to complete a home.
“When I was first there, I saw all these partially built homes. I thought they were abandoned houses. But they were homes in progress. You buy a few bricks a year. When couples marry, they start houses for their children. There is an overwhelming sense of poverty. People are living in cardboard houses. They exist off trash.’
“You have to see it to believe it,’ said Berkshire. “That first year what we did for the people of San Luis was like me handing you $150,000 and saying build yourself a house.’
Besides participating in missions and granting financial support, local residents also support SonLight Missions through prayer ministry. A prayer schedule is put together during missions with local residents praying for the missionaries during their trips. J. Paul Pepper of Belle Vernon is in charge of the prayer ministry.
For more information or to contribute to SonLight Missions, contact officials at 163 Goodwin Road, Smithfield 15478 or phone 724-569-4479 or visit the Web site at www.sonlightmissions.org.