About our Mission Work
Over the past 9 months, Taryn and I have been traveling and doing volunteer work in Central America. We have worked in three countries with a several NGOs, and our eyes have been opened to the incredible needs of the people in Central America. We, however, find ourselves questioning how exactly the work we are doing is going to help the people and communities for the long term (and ideally without creating dependants).
Through continuous reflection and prayer, we are seeking ways that we can walk alongside the poor, learn their story, be accepted as fellow brothers and sisters by the communities in which we serve, and work in a spirit of partnership and reciprocity. To this end, we seek to empower transformational change as opposed to traditional development. Transformational change (or transformational development*) is a 3 dimensional approach to development with a focus on spiritual formation, meeting physical and emotional needs, and modeling integrity on all relational levels (personal, public, business practices etc).
Building positive and empowering relationships with individuals and church bodies, cultural integration, and modeling integrity are the foundations of our development goals. We aim to partner with local churches and walk along-side their initiatives adding our personal touches based on the gifts that God has gives us. Ryan is a certified Teacher with the Onatio College of teachers and has a heart for worship through music as well as audio production. Taryn has uncanny organizational skills, and she has a heart for worship through photography and teaching. Our long-term goal is to work with integrity with local communities and churches in Central America to help empower transformational change in the lives of the people as they cross over from poverty into the bounty and blessings of the living God through the saving grace of Jesus.
*Reference: Walking with the Poor by Bryant L. Myers.
We met some
friends in La Ceiba, Hondruas who invited us to an
orphanage on the island of Roatan to help out for a few months. The
orphanage was in a crisis situation as there was no one to look after the 12 kids living here.
Our job was to come in as an emergency relief team with three
other (amazing) individuals, and help bring stability back
into the orphanage. This humanitarian/missions trip brought
us to the realization that we were ready to thrust our time and resources into cross-cultural missions.
For more information
about what this will eventually look like practically for us, please check
outwww.wellspringcommunity.cc
Fund
Raising Fund raising is an essential part of missions, but we
wanted to find a creative and interesting way
to raise money that would enable us to continue doing missions work
for the long term. Creating music has always been my professional
passion, and using it as a springboard for our missions work was a natural
solution. So, we decided that it was time
for me to put the final touches on all of my music and publish it. I registered a
record label called "Sleep Over Records" with the Ontario Government
and began putting together the legal documents I needed for signing
artists (namely, myself!) and licensing music.
Music can be purchased through my self publishing site here
By purchasing my
music, you will be doing two things: 1) helping me to continue doing what
I love, and 2) enabling us to continue along the path that we feel God is
leading us down in missions.
Levity Project is not
a for-profit band, but we are also not
a registered charity. We are
offering a product for a dollar value like any other business. The
difference is that the profit we make will go directly into our missions work to
cover our living, material, and travel expenses. For the band and music to continue, I
will thus be relying solely on donations of professional skills and sponsorship to help with
touring, recording, marketing & CD distribution.
If you are
interested in donating professional skills to the band (i.e. if you are a drummer, or bass player who can self-record) or would like to financially sponsoring an aspect of
the band, please email me at levityproject@gmail.com.
We also have a paypal account to accept donations (at this point, not tax deductible). You can also look us up on Skype by adding levityproject as one of your contacts!
