During the 2022 summer, TEAMeffort’s Western Kentucky chapter will bring its services to help tornado recovery efforts and those in need. Throughout these weeks, teens and the TEAMeffort staff will be helping communities from La Center to Mayfield, Kentucky.
Based out of multiple states, TEAMeffort hosts children, ages 12 to 18, on week-long mission trips. Each summer, multiple groups will complete projects such as repairing and renovating homes for families in need, building mission and ministry facilities, leading children’s outreach programs, working at homeless shelters, responding to natural disasters, and reaching out to individuals and communities through Christian service.
Michael Olesky began working for TEAMeffort in 2019 as a staff person, moving up to director in 2020. After graduating college, Olesky now works full-time alongside TEAMeffort, making sure all camp planning is complete. Contract setups, housing details, and more, fall under his belt. However, his favorite thing is getting to witness the growth not only in the campers but in the staff and community as well.
“Getting to see the campers witness the changes within their youth groups each week as they work together on these different projects is just amazing,” said Olesky. “They get to be the hands and feet of Christ within these communities, truly understanding what it means to really serve and put others first.”
Allowing these youth groups to grow closer and connect, to spend one on one time with one another and away from the technology in busyness in life for just a week has been more than a rewarding factor.
“As for the staff, it’s also really awesome to see. We get to see all of these projects through completion. Each group of teens is only here for a week, so they may only see one deck done. However the staff is here all summer,” said Olesky. “They get to see the deck done, but also the house repaired, the roof redone, and the impact that it has, not only for the homeowner, but for the community as well.”
Just two weeks in, Olesky is overwhelmed with joy seeing how many people have called and asked for their help. The word that TEAMeffort is here to assist has spread like wildfire.
“You can go in anywhere, in La Center for example, and just hear people talking about TEAMeffort,” said Olesky. “It’s just a really cool experience from a staff viewpoint getting to see how much these volunteers are influencing the whole community and not just one homeowner.”
Each week, between 110 and 200 students come to camp. By the end of the summer, TEAMeffort hosts from 1,500 to 2,000 teens for a total of eight weeks in the summer. This summer, they are staying within a renovated preschool building that now serves as a housing facility.
“The church has really been pouring into this camp. The pastor here at First Baptist, Jason Hay, has been with the camp for 15 to 20 years, and has just had awesome experiences with TEAMeffort, so he wanted to host a camp in his community after seeing the need,” said Olesky. “The church has just been super awesome and pouring into us and getting us connected with people in the community. And the groups have been amazing. The community has been super welcoming to us. They are all just sharing who we are with people and pointing us to our people in need. And it’s really cool to see the community band together, even if they weren’t affected by the tornado, just to be able to build up their neighbors and offer them help in any way that they can.”
During the first week of being in La Center, TEAMeffort went around knocking door to door, just trying to find people that they could serve. Building a new deck or offering a free roof, free of cost – they just wanted to help.
“Near Barlow, we had a moment that really stuck with me. I was driving around trying to find places that we could serve. I knocked on this one lady’s door because her deck was falling apart and we wanted to help,” said Olesky. “She just broke down.”
Little did TEAMeffort know, her three-year-old grandchild comes over all the time. But she was too scared to let them out on the deck since it was falling apart, and it left them nowhere to play outside.
“She said she didn’t want to keep them inside all summer, but she lost her job due to COVID-19 and things have just been hitting her very hard after that. She hadn’t been about to repair anything,” said Olesky.
In TEAMeffort fashion, they were able to not only build her a brand new deck and clean up her yard, but they built her an entirely new playset for her grandchild.
“She just broke down in tears, telling us that this is what she had been praying for. Praying for someone, praying for us, to come and serve and offer this help,” said Olesky. “It was something so small for us to do, but for her, this was a life-changing thing and now her grandchild will have a place to play. It’s something the child probably won’t remember 10 years from now, but for right now – that’s huge.”
Olesky’s heart lies within disaster relief. For the previous two years, TEAMeffort has been in North Carolina, helping the remaining needs from Hurricane Florence. Therefore, he always wants to jump in and help when he hears about natural disasters that hit communities.
The TEAMeffort Western Kentucky camp was already in existence, prior to the December 10 tornadoes. For summer 2022, they were already planning to come to La Center to do community outreach and rebuild anything anyone in the area was struggling with.
“When we heard about the tornado hitting, we were just shocked. It was just so crazy to see that the Lord had orchestrated us already being in the area prior to us ever knowing that it needed to be helped,” said Olesky.
Each week, TEAMeffort takes Mondays to come to Mayfield and help relief efforts in any way they can. Partnering with pastors and churches in the area, they’ve been able to assist the community in projects people have requested. Not only this, but groups have also been walking up and down the streets with buckets, brooms, and trash bags – trying to bag up as much as they can from the sidewalks to bring back just the slightest bit of normalcy for the community.
“It sounds like such a small thing, but being able to restore a clean sidewalk for people to have is such a huge thing,” said Olesky. “So far, we’re partnering and walking around door to door just to see where we can serve the best in Mayfield.”
Olesky just wants to represent Christ within the communities they enter, in the best way they can. By showing love, grace, and compassion that Christ has shown to each and every one.
“Just pouring that out into the community in whatever way that looks like, whether it just be if they don’t have any repairs, just being able to talk with them and listening to hear them,” said Olesky. “Building them a new deck or completely redoing their house, if that’s what it takes, just to be there and encourage them and point them to Christ and the love that He has for them.”
There’s also more in their underlying work, especially within disaster relief.
“I think it’s really important for the world to see that just because the tornado hit in December and it was on the news for about a month – just because it’s not on the news anymore, doesn’t mean that it’s not still happening,” said Olesky. “It’s still people’s day-to-day lives. And that doesn’t mean that people are waking up every day and they are having to figure out how to fix their roof or how to fix their siding and then also work and sustain themselves.”
TEAMeffort knew that there was going to be a good opportunity for them to come in, to show love and compassion to the people, and just serve them to the best they could. Though also giving a good opportunity for their youth to see the impacts of disasters outside of what the news has to show.
Each day may include something new project-wise for TEAMeffort, however, one thing remains the same. Their mission is to lean on one another, and build not only each other up, but the community up, together, through Christ.
