Caps for chemo
Published 8:39 am Thursday, July 25, 2013
Members of the Powellsville Baptist Church and Mars Hill Baptist Church Vacation Bible School, who collected nearly 25,000 plastic bottle caps, pose at the church with their collection: (front row) Trent Hoggard, Wesley Bandy, (2nd row) Rhonda Barber, Lindsey Faella, (back row) Jim Hopkins, pastor, Tina Brown, Mallory Ward, Hannah Worrells, Paul Northcott, Dylan Harrell, and Nolan Clark. Staff Photo by Gene Motley
POWELLSVILLE – Usually a week of summer Vacation Bible School ends with a hot dog lunch, a certificate, and some songs.
But last Friday, Powellsville Baptist Church “capped” their week of VBS in a different way.
As a joint effort of both Powellsville Baptist and nearby Mars Hill Baptist Church in the Trap community – which both combined on the project – the VBS group collected 24,339 plastic bottle tops to help a local Bertie County teen with her fight against childhood cancer. The tops were presented to her and a family member at the close of Bible School on Friday.
Lindsey Faella, a 2013 graduate of Bertie High School and former member of the Lady Falcons’ softball team, began collecting the bottle tops to help cancer patients at North Carolina Children’s Hospital in Chapel Hill.
For every 500 bottle tops that are collected, one child can receive a free chemotherapy treatment at NCCH.
The tops can come from any plastic container with the exception of prescription medication bottle caps.
What makes this project even more special is that Lindsey herself was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at birth and has been receiving treatment every three months in Chapel Hill.
Lindsey saw a need to help others as she fights her own life-threatening illness and that’s where she got the idea for the local cap collection.
“My dad’s friend helped start it at his church (Ross Baptist) near Askewville,” she said. “A lady (April Smithwick) started it and she was hoping just to raise 500 tops in a week for one child.”
Lindsey went on to add, “Some of the ladies that work with my aunt are members at Powellsville, so they thought it would be a good project for the children that week at Bible School. If we keep collecting caps we can sponsor more kids.”
“The children were just outstanding,” said Powellsville pastor, the Rev. Jim Hopkins.
“This was an effort from both churches, Powellsville and Mars Hill, and the children, the parents, and everyone who was just so giving.” Rev. Hopkins added.
“We just praise the Lord for this because these days more churches need to come together in unity.”
The VBS children’s effort received a big boost when Berry Plastics of Ahoskie heard about the project and their business donated 4,000 bottle caps alone.
