Called to serve

Young Chang

For two years, Tim Nelson lived among Ukrainians suffering from

poverty. They ate watered-down soup, beets, cabbages and potatoes. Kids

in orphanages were shabbily dressed in the winter. Cracked windows let

the air in, and uncarpeted floors froze children’s feet.

Nelson has been back from his Christian mission trip for more than a

year now, but these images haven’t faded.

Of course, he remembers sunny summer days, pretty spring flowers and a

winter sky that didn’t look so bleak once he adjusted to his new

environment. But most vividly, Nelson, a member of the Newport Coast

Singles Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,

remembers adults and children who lived without luxuries and often

without necessities.

About two weeks ago, the UC Irvine senior began setting up a Southern

California branch of Project Reach Out, a nonprofit organization working

to improve the condition of orphanages in Eastern Europe and Russia.

Based in Salt Lake City, Project Reach Out was founded by two fellow

missionaries in the Ukraine -- Benjamin Becker and Nathan Shipp. It made

its first overseas trip last year, bringing money to the Ukraine and

purchasing food, clothing, medicine and medical devices there to avoid

going through customs officials.

Inspired, Nelson is starting a local chapter. For now, headquarters

is his dormitory room. He is looking for local individual and corporate

donors.

“I feel like Orange County is a very wealthy area,” he said. “And it’s

very blessed in many ways. People are generous and willing to give to a

worthy cause.”

From Utah, Becker said he would like the program to expand as widely

as possible.

“We would like to keep it always personal,” he said. “But the more

children we can help, the more lives we can change.”

Nelson, 23, left for the Ukraine when he was 19. The Newport Coast

Singles Branch sponsored the trip, as do many local churches for their

missionaries.

Ric Olsen, pastor of global outreach at Harbor Trinity Church in Costa

Mesa, said congregants there sponsor annual mission trips to Romania and

Mexico. It is part of the faith experience for churches to sponsor these

trips.

“Your faith will die if you don’t give it away,” Olsen said. “There’s

a point where, if we sit back and just absorb everything that God gives

us, it will become really a poison that will kill us. The more you give

away, the more you’ll get.”

Congregants of Latter-day Saints churches believe 19 is a good time

for young men to serve as missionaries, Nelson said. His parents

preferred he finish his schooling first, but the political-science major

felt he had to go when he did.

“I was so happy, I wanted to share it with others,” Nelson said. “I

have been given so much in my life, and I owe much of my life to my

religious beliefs.”

He put his life here on hold and served overseas for two years without

visiting once. Sure, he missed his family, his friends, a good pizza, but

his cause soon overpowered the homesickness.

He taught English, visited children in hospitals, donated clothing and

other goods to schools and invalid hospitals and transported buckets of

dirt to help build a greenhouse at an orphanage for kids with

developmental disabilities.

He also evangelized on the streets, sharing his faith with people

passing by.

Nelson’s faith and service has also helped his personal life. He said

being a missionary gave him discipline, organization and a perspective on

what’s important in life.

The law school applicant worked with Newport Beach Councilman John

Heffernan during last fall’s campaign. Nelson said Heffernan respected

that he was a missionary, which helped him get the job.

Looking ahead, Nelson wants to help children in the Ukraine, whose

faces he still remembers.

“When you’re over there for two years, you really grow to love the

people,” he said.

FYI

For more information on the Southern California chapter of Project

Reach Out, call Tim Nelson at (949) 854-9195.