“One generation commends your works to another;
    they tell of your mighty acts.” – Psalm 145:4

 

 

 

October 2026

Fall greetings from The Good Works Community of HOPE!!

The colors of the Fall season here in southeast Ohio are beautiful. We feel grateful to experience this beauty every year! In this newsletter, I want to take you behind the scenes and talk about some of the vision, values and mechanics of what makes Good Works unique.
 

As most of you know, our mission is focused on helping people make connections, which can be transformational and life changing. We provide care and community, temporary housing and food, cars and appliances, a free laundromat, and opportunities to serve our neighbors… but we continually and intentionally seek to make connections!  We especially delight in facilitating relationships and then seeing how our volunteer’s impact and are influenced by the people we are learning to love and serve together. Seeing the different ways mutuality and reciprocity are revealed in each relationship is significant to us. We welcome so many people who feel excluded and lonely (including some of our volunteers). In 2025, Good Works welcomed about 1000 volunteers. Maybe the best solution to loneliness is connection. Good Works provides multiple ways for people to meet and serve/help one another in healthy, life-giving experiences. Describing the “who” of those impacted is always interesting, because it is both/and. We are as grateful to see our volunteers transformed by the people we welcome at The Timothy House or Friday Night Life as we are seeing the people we love and help transformed, and experience HOPE.  Both are difficult to measure. 

 

There continues to be a lot of good conversation about the value of loving God and loving people. People often need a place to show and demonstrate their love for their neighbors. Good Works provides that place, and we do so carefully, in a safe, structured, life-giving, inspiring and educational way.  What better way to learn about the history, values, beauty and needs of rural Appalachia than through life-giving relationships with those who live and grew up here. Many years ago, I had a difficult and challenging situation with several residents staying with us, and I cried out to the Lord with this: “Lord, I cannot help these people”. Immediately, I heard that still, small voice of God in my heart say, “I know. I have sent them to help you”.

CONNECTION: Photo at left is one of our Transformation Station car celebrations. We affirm the person receiving their vehicle and they also share their experience of connection with us. Photo at the right is how we connect at Friday Night Life, around tables in a safe space over a meal.

We have been providing overnight accommodations for adults and children who experience homelessness through Good Works since January 1981. If I’m doing the math correctly, we have been open about 16,700 nights as of this month. Why the numbers? Because each night represents a person coming in (or covering the house) from 9:00 pm and staying overnight to around 8:00 am.  In the first 4 years, I did that. I lived at #3 Elliott Street, and the shelter was in our basement. When Good Works moved to the Central Avenue property (later named The Timothy House), we initially had House Managers who lived there and stayed every night. Then, we hired overnight workers in 1986 and they stayed overnight, every night. All this to say that it takes a lot of coordination, communication and commitment to be open for sixteen thousand, seven hundred nights.  And we feel it. I feel it. We recently had a conversation about the difficulties in this particular aspect of Good Works. While this is a paid position, we are challenged with finding willing, wise and godly people interested in stepping up two nights a week to serve in this way. We are asking for your prayers. (Matthew 9:38)

As most of you know, Good Works has no debt. We are stewards of 7 buildings at three different locations.  And so, some of the donations you provide help us with maintenance, (upkeep), insurance, and utilities creating and sustaining beautiful places (and spaces) through which we carry out the ministry God has trusted us with. People need workspaces. Groups need places to prepare food and a place to share a meal, have private meetings and relax. And there are bedrooms and bathrooms. Between our 3 locations, there are 5 kitchens and 12 bathrooms and 5 porches. We rely upon the kindness, generosity and commitment of our supporters to help us keep all of these places clean, safe, functional, and yet “home-like”. But these are just facilities. Indeed, only facilities. Keeping our priorities in order, we know that these are simply structures, vehicles through which people experience hospitality, care, compassion and love. The centerpiece of what we do is to love people and in doing so, become agents of healing and HOPE, offering practical help, emotional support and spiritual life. Thank you for supporting us, enabling us to be agents of change for good; to add to our faith, goodness. (II Peter 1:5)

Sign of HOPE, our initiative to assist adults with physical disabilities and adults with service animals was completed in 2023. This is also where we offer Loads of HOPE, our free laundromat.

The Good Works Timothy House has provided temporary housing, care and community to adults and children who experience homelessness since 1984.

The Good Works property on Luhrig Road (since 1994) includes the Picnic shelter, (where we host Friday Night Life 6 months a year). The Hannah House, the Adm. Building (where our Bed and Breakfast is located), The Transformation Station, The Hope Center and the Carter Cabin.

STORIES: We are currently in our Fall season at Good Works. I have been reflecting on the season of Transformation Station volunteers we are currently in. It is a harder season for us. We are seeing our volunteers struggle with life circumstances that can get in the way of their ability to volunteer consistently. One young gal has three small children at home and a car that is very unreliable. She does have a small support system that is helping her with getting childcare and rides to Good Works to volunteer. Even with a support system it isn’t easy. The daycare will often shut down, and she can’t come because she has her children at home. These situations are sobering to me. They remind me that sometimes we just can’t control everything, and we all have obstacles we have no control over that slow us down.

– Kim Hudelson (Kim serves as the Director of Operations and has been with Good Works since 2020)

I served as night shift staff at the Timothy House for about three years while I was in school. During my last month or so there, a young man named Larry moved into the house. He was not originally from Ohio, but after serving in the military for a few years he ended up in Athens without any connections or support. Larry was not a mean person, but the way he spoke to people and the words he chose often had an edge to them, and even his compliments to others felt backhanded. However, he seemed to enjoy talking with me, and we would often talk for a bit after finishing our chores since we were around the same age and had a lot of the same interests and pop culture knowledge. On my final night at the Timothy House, we had a really long conversation. He shared stories about his family and went into his genealogy and friendships, and we got to bond over our mutual love for the woods. This was the most he had ever told me about his life. When it was time for lights out, he started going up the stairs and said very sincerely, "We're going to miss having you around." I was going to miss him too.

– Luke Duncan (Luke was a summer intern before joining the night staff during his college years. He currently works with Work Retreat groups and Transformation Station volunteers).

IN CLOSING

I want to say once again that I see what we do as a trust. We trust God. God trusts us. You trust us through your giving and prayers and time and love. We give thanks!

If you would like to participate in the mission and ministry of Good Works through giving, 

you can send a gift to:

 

Good Works

PO Box 4,

Athens, Ohio 45701

 

Or visit the MAKE A DONATION part of our website
https://good-works.net/make-a-donation

740.594.3339