A YOUNG AMERICAN MISSIONARY FROM UPSTATE NEW YORK STARTS NEW NONDENOMINATIONAL MISSION IN THE DOMINICAN REPUPUBLIC
Nick Serianni and his Dominican wife have started a mission to work with the impoverished children in the city of Santiago. The desire of their heart is to help these children with their family struggles in the face of poverty, to provide them with educational opportunities, and to bring them into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Currently, their organization, Semillas de Esperanza (Seeds of Hope), is running programs for three groups of children in different neighborhoods. Nick and Wendy are living and running their programs on only $12,000 a year from donations. They need you to partnership with them in prayer and finances.
(PRWEB) November 5, 2002
NEWS RELEASE NOVEMBER 2002
SEMILLAS de ESPERANZA
(SEEDS OF HOPE)
A MINISTRY OF NICK AND WENDY SERIANNI
CHRISTIAN MISSIONARIES TO THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
“So is the kingdom of God, as if amanshould cast seed into
the ground; and should sleep, and rise night and day, and
the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.
For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade,
then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the
fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle,
because the harvest is come.”
Mark 4:26-29
A young American man from upstate New York and his wife have begun a new non-denominational Christian missionary program in the Dominican Republic. Twenty-two year-old Nicholas Serianni form Ticonderoga, New York, moved to the Dominican Republic two years ago. Initially, he worked as a volunteer with Youth With A Mission and Compassion International while he immersed himself in the culture and the language of that nation. He also studied Spanish formally.
Within the year, he had mastered the language sufficiently enough to start working with teens and children in the city of Santiago, the second largest city in the central part of the Dominican Republic. He also continued working as a volunteer with the other two mission organizations. Nick's work with children became a real calling on his life. He and Wendy Payano, a young Dominican woman missionary with Youth With A Mission, soon started their own mission organization to work with children They named it Semillas de Esperanza or Seeds of Hope. Wendy and Nick were married in the Dominican Republic in February of 2002, and they have devoted their lives as a couple to missionary work with the children of the Dominican Republic.
Nick brought with him to the Dominican Republic an extensive background in mission experience and training. He went on his first summer mission outreach to Grenada with Teens for Christ, his fathers youth organization, at the age of eleven. He attributes his "call" to missions to the reading of Bruchko, an autobiography by Bruce Olson, the missionary who ventured into the unchartered interior of the Amazon at the age of nineteen. Nick said that after reading Olson's book, he knew without a doubt that God was calling him to be a missionary.
Subsequently, Nick volunteered for summer mission outreaches every year with either Teens for Christ or Teen World Outreach to such places as Grenada, Florida, Haiti, St. Croix, and Nepal. At the end of his sophomore year in high school as an honor student, Nick home schooled so that he could complete his next two years of studies in one year. While his friends were attending their senior year in high school, he matriculated in Youth with a Mission's University of the Nations and went on a medical outreach to Benin, West Africa, aboard the Mercy Ship, the Anatsasis.
He was accompanied by his brother Demitri who took a leave of absence from his college studies to join the outreach team.
Nick has earned an Associates Degree in Community Development from the University of the Nations while working around the world as a volunteer missionary and as a student at training centers in Hawaii, Indonesia, Switzerland, and Niger, West Africa. One of Nick's most rewarding experiences was working and training under Mr. Paul Abbott, the director of World Vision, Niger. Nick is currently studying toward a BachelorÂ’s Degree in Theology through the International Theological Seminary.
Wendy's career as a missionary began in 1995, when she attended a Discipleship Training School with the University of the Nations in Jarabacoa, Dominican Republic. Since that time she has been a full-time volunteer with Youth With A Mission and Compassion International. She has worked in the areas of hospitality and mercy missions, and with children's ministries, such as the girls club in Jarabacoa and the Compassion Program for which she was a counselor and a teacher of dance, art, and cooking.
More recently, Wendy has been in charge of the children's ministry for YWAM and ran summer training sessions for Kings Kids, a team of young people who evangelize through street performances. Wendy has a special gift for working with children and, in addition to working with Seeds of Hope, she still teaches in the Compassion Program at her local church.
Semillas de Esperanza or Seeds of Hope is an outreach to the impoverished children of Santiago who have little or no hope for the future. At the present time, Nick and Wendy have group programs in three different city neighborhoods, one of which is in the poorest and most crime-ridden areas of Santiago. Do to limited financial resources, the groups meet in public parks or on private property made availably by civic-minded individuals. The group programs include arts and crafts, sports, instruction in reading and writing, after school assistance, social skills, health care, and Bible study. Members of the youth group from the church Nick and Wendy attend volunteer in assisting with these programs.
In addition to the weekly meetings, Seeds of Hope conducts Campamentos or Bible camps during the summer that are either one or two weeks long. This past summer's campamentos were very successful. The first had an attendance of twenty children, the second one had an enrollment of twenty-five children, and the third had one hundred and twenty children in attendance.
Nick and Wendy's vision for the future is to purchase a large van, so they can take the children to the beaches, on camping trips, and on field trips to landmarks of the Dominican Republic. Their long range goal is to buy a piece of property and build a youth center where they cannot only run their current programs but also provide training in marketable skills, such as carpentry, furniture making, sewing, etc. Wendy, in fact, is enrolled in a sewing school where she is mastering the skills she in turn will impart to her students.
The desire of Nick and Wendy's heart is to help these children with their family struggles in the face of poverty, to provide them with educational opportunities, and to bring them into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Their work is based on Mark 4:26-29 which explains that what a man sows, God brings to fruition, and a harvest results. The harvest that Nick and Wendy hope to reap through their mission work will be the social, economical, and spiritual well-being of the children and their families and, ultimately, the salvation of this nation. They are currently in the process of incorporating Seeds of Hope as a U. S. based nonprofit organization.
Nick and Wendy Serianni are accomplishing a great deal on about $12,000 per year. Their only source of income for their personal support and the operating expenses for their work with Semilla de Esperanza are the monthly donations made by a small group of supporters: individuals from Nick's hometown of Ticonderoga, relatives, and people who have learned of their work.
Therefore, they are in need of people who are willing to partnership with them, through financial support and prayer, in their noteworthy work of spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ and planting seeds of hope in the minds and hearts of the children of the Dominican Republic. If you are interested in receiving a monthly newsletter or making a donation to Semilla de Esperanza or Seeds of Hope, please write to Nick and Wendy at 75 Lake George Avenue, Ticonderoga, NY 12883 or contacting them by email (NSerianni@compuserve. com). Until incorporation occurs, donations should be made in the name of Nicholas Serianni.
