A Family Legacy: Rebuilding Hope

Family legacies are deeply meaningful. Perhaps you can look back on past generations in your family that have handed down meaningful traditions, or you have family members who have created generational impact through their work or a hobby. For Jessica and Ron Grassmid, their family legacy involves volunteering to bring hope to many others.

In 2011, Ron began volunteering with World Renew Disaster Response Services (DRS). He spent nine years offering his tree-cutting, siding, drywalling, and other skills to help repair homes in disaster-impacted communities. He traveled to New Jersey, Alabama, and even Puerto Rico with his granddaughter, Jessica. By his mid-seventies, when the COVID-19 pandemic put a pause on World Renew DRS volunteer programs, Ron’s volunteering came to a halt.

But even during and after the pandemic, disaster survivors have needed help to recover from the storms that have tended to devastate millions of people each year in North America. Just last year in May 2024, for example, about three years after the pandemic, the challenges of facing an EF-2 tornado were felt in Cass County, Mich., not far from the DRS Michigan headquarters.

When she saw the damage that her neighboring community was facing in Cass County, Jessica Grassmid thought back to her DRS experience helping Hurricane Maria survivors in Puerto Rico with her grandfather. She realized this was an opportunity for her to get involved in the ministry again. “It’s important to be a light in the world and to help people when their lives are abruptly turned upside down by a disaster,” Jessica said.

Jessica decided to join a World Renew DRS clean-up team that was beginning work in Cass County. She said she also sensed a need to recruit her grandfather Ron to join her again. So Ron, Jessica, and other volunteers spent several days cutting down trees and removing debris from homeowners’ yards. A couple of months later, Ron went on to volunteer with a clean-up team in northwestern Iowa after devastating floods occurred there. The team spent two weeks being the hands and feet of Jesus in Hawarden, Iowa, mucking out basements and ministering hope to the community.

Mike, a disaster survivor in Iowa, shared with Ron and others about the flood’s challenges. Ron recalled, “Mike first approached us for advice on mold treatment. But, as we discussed more about other circumstances in his life, Mike explained that this hard experience of his home being flooded left him weary. In this situation, he said, he knew he needed to draw closer to God. We were able to pray together for Mike’s recovery and for God’s plans for his future.”

Recently the grandfather-and-granddaughter duo were back on the ground together in West Virginia, making a difference for people affected by Hurricane Helene. Ron, Jessica, and the volunteer team helped to clean up some of the estimated 1,000 downed trees in the area due to Helene’s heavy winds.

These experiences, said Ron and Jessica, are meaningful to them not only because of the opportunity to volunteer together but also because of the opportunity to strengthen their relationship. “Through strenuous clean-up work like this, I’ve seen my grandfather’s heart for others during these rich volunteer experiences with DRS. What a fantastic legacy to try to live up to,” Jessica said.

Ron said he sees that these volunteer trips together have provided amazing quality time to spend with Jessica: “I don’t know what better time there could be than to volunteer together with my granddaughter to help others.”