Rebecca Neafcy views life from a different perspective after working side-by-side with Nicaraguan families during an April Thrivent Builds Worldwide trip. Rebecca Neafcy fully expected to work hard building homes and changing the lives of Nicaraguan families. While these expectations were met, it came as a surprise that she was also personally and strongly impacted by the experience.

"I went on this international volunteer trip to help others, but I, too, was blessed," Neafcy said. "Service brings out the best in us-that's the beauty in volunteering. You get the focus off yourself."

Neafcy, a Thrivent Financial Associate serving Christians and their family members in the Lehigh Valley, traveled to Nicaragua with other Thrivent Financial representatives and employees from across the United States. Neafcy was selected to represent her colleagues from the Pennsylvania Region on this team because she demonstrated notable performance, passion for volunteering with members, and drive to help people become financially secure.

Unlike regular days at the office helping people with their financial security, the Thrivent Financial representatives put a new twist on their role in Nicaragua painting, carrying rock, mixing concrete and mortar by hand, and bending rebar to help enable families to afford to buy a safe, new home.

This past April, the team helped construct homes in the Central American country. As the homes were built, relationships grew with the local people. The team enjoyed building with the Habitat Nicaragua partner families who will live in the homes. These families have to apply for and purchase the Habitat houses, just like in the United States, and put in sweat equity before they can move in.

"Too many Nicaraguans live in substandard housing, and by our American standards, they have very little," Neafcy said. "Despite having few worldly possessions, the Nicaraguans I met displayed a wealth of spirit, love and generosity."

The experience in Central America invigorated Neafcy, and she plans to share this experience with as many people as possible to raise awareness of the burden of poverty housing and encourage others to get involved in similar service work.

Neafcy is planning to return to Nicaragua 2016 to build more homes. She is asking people in the community to join her. Anyone interested in going on the trip may contact Rebecca at 610-807-9513/Rebecca.neafcy@thrivent.com.

"There was great satisfaction in helping families build one of the most basic human needs-a roof over their heads," Neafcy said.

ABOUT THE PROGRAM

Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity is a multi-year, multi-million dollar mission partnership between Thrivent Financial and Habitat for Humanity International. Thrivent Builds is designed to involve Thrivent members and Christians in helping provide a "hand up" to people in need of affordable housing, offering them a path to greater economic independence. Excluding government funding, Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity is Habitat's largest single source of funding, constructing and repairing more than 4,000 homes in the U.S. and around the world since 2005. For more information, visit ThriventBuilds.com.