Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

By JOYANNA LOVE/ Senior Staff Writer

Thorsby First Baptist Church in partnership with Smoking Guns Bar-B-Que is holding a fundraiser on May 4.

“Our church is going on a mission trip this coming June,” Pastor Marc Hodges said.

He said the owner of Smoking Guns Bar-B-Que attends the church and offered to host a fundraiser.

“It’s a way to come get a great lunch and help a mission trip at the same time,” Hodges said.

Ten percent of the proceeds from the day (11 a.m. to 7 p.m.) will go toward the church’s fund for the trip.

“We are going to the Dominican Republic,” Hodges said.

The team will be working with a local church there ministering to children and women.

“There is a ministry they have to women that have been in the sex trade, to get them out of that lifestyle and come to know Christ,” Hodges said.

The ministry also helps these women develop skills for employment.

Team members will also help with a baseball ministry.

“Baseball is huge in the Dominican Republic,” Hodges said.

There are 23 members of the church participating in the trip.

Although the church has done several mission trips throughout the southeastern U.S., Hodges said, as far as he knows, this is the first international mission trip the church has done.

“We hope and pray this will not be our last one,” Hodges said.

Smoking Guns Bar-B-Que is located at 3988 Seventh St. N.