October 15, 2018

Re: Emergency Aid is needed when natural disasters come at the untimeliest moments. 

Dear followers of Spiritual Minutemen,

Hillsdale Baptist Church was one of the first ministries to send a man into the Florida Panhandle to assess the path of destruction left in the wake of Hurricane Michael. The cost of lives and the loss of homes and businesses is incalculable at this time. What we do know is there are tens of thousands suffering without water, electricity, and shelter.

Sunday evening, October 14, 2018, Hillsdale’s first Disaster Relief Team arrived in Panama City with a large box truck filled with pallets of bottled water, non-perishable canned goods, paper goods, including diapers, and cleaning supplies.

Hillsdale’s team is:

• Distributing bottled water and food to areas where no aid has reached to date.
• Assisting families with removing downed trees from rooftops and driveways.
• Identifying smaller outlying coastal towns that have received no assistance.
• Giving aid and comfort.

Our current goal is to send two additional teams to the Florida Panhandle. Our first team is staged in Panama City at two sites: Central Baptist Church and Lighthouse Baptist Church.  I have been advised our second and third teams will thrust out from Panama City to small coastal towns devastated by the hurricane.

Our fellow Floridians are desperate for pallets of water, cases of non-perishable foods, paper goods (including diapers), and cleaning supplies. We welcome all donations, both financial assistance and cases of water and non-perishable goods.

For financial donations, go to Hillsdale’s website, www.HillsdaleBaptist.org, find the Donations button in the upper righthand corner, and follow instructions listing your gift under “Other” and typing in Disaster Relief (your financial donations are tax-deductible and anonymous to this pastor unless you communicate with me directly).

You have this pastor’s assurance that all donations will go directly to Hillsdale’s Disaster Relief Effort in the Florida Panhandle.

With the heart of a shepherd,

Dr. Travis D. Smith

Senior Pastor

Hillsdale Baptist Church