The Great Rivers fellowship and East carroll parish

Over the last fifty years, the Mississippi and Louisiana Delta regions have undergone several changes with sometimes devastating effects.

Throughout the Louisiana Delta,changes in farming technology and loss of jobs for locals have forever changed the local economies and created an increase in the number of people living in poverty.

Together for Hope-Louisiana, a ministry of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, is part of a nation-wide community development network that also includes a) Shaw, Mississippi, b) Helena-West Helena, Arkansas, c) Oglala-Lakota, South Dakota, d) Halifax County, North Carolina, e) McCreary, Owsley, and Powell Counties, Kentucky, f) Cochise County, Arizona, g) Perry County, Alabama, h) Presidio, Maverick, Dimmit, Zavala, Willacy, Starr and Hidalgo Counties, Texas, along with others across the U.S.

Launched in 2001, the dream for Together for Hope developed out of the Fellowship's Global Missions commitment to most neglected peoples. It was decided to research the counties with the highest percentages of their total population living below the nationally established poverty line, based on the 1995 census. 

In Louisiana, our work is focused in East Carroll Parish (Lake Providence, parish seat). 

Volunteers participate in house and church repair, health care, clothing, literacy, food supply, recreation, Vacation Bible Schools and day camps, economic development, job skills training, and a variety of community development activities.