The year 2025 is only three weeks old and Kellee Gentry and Jill Burch already have big plans for this summer.
The Montgomery County residents plan to go on a mission trip to Africa in early …
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The year 2025 is only three weeks old and Kellee Gentry and Jill Burch already have big plans for this summer.
The Montgomery County residents plan to go on a mission trip to Africa in early June. They will join 10 other women on the nine-day trip, which is scheduled to start on June 3. They have created a Facebook page (Jill & Kellee’s Mission Trip to Africa June 2025) about their trip.
Gentry and Burch are members of High Hill Christian Church. Gentry is the spiritual formation director and her husband Robert is the lead pastor. Burch, who has been a member of the church for over two years, works as an executive assistant.
Gentry will be making her second trip to Africa. She went to Uganda with her husband and two other people in 2011.
“We met with a pastor from Uganda,” Gentry said. “I was a little nervous to go back without Robert, but Jill seems like she can take care of me. I’m excited to go back.”
Burch will be making her first trip to Africa.
“I’m super excited,” Burch said. “I’ve been involved in child sponsorship in Haiti. I’ve been to Haiti several times. So this has always been a lifelong dream of mine to go to Africa.”
But in order to go to Africa, Gentry and Burch will have to raise $5,000 each to pay for transportation and lodging. They each have a $1,500 payment due on Feb. 2. The balance is due in April. Anyone who wants to donate can send a check to Gentry and Burch or go to their VENMO accounts (@JillWorley-Burch and @Kellee-Gentry).
Gentry and Burch started making plans on the African trip after attending a Leading and Loving It conference in October at Las Vegas, Nev. Leading and Loving It is a women’s ministry based in the Las Vegas area. During the conference, it raised $24,000 for a well.
“They said in July 2025, we’re going to see the well and dedicate the well that the money was raised for,” Gentry said. “We got to apply (for the trip). Anyone who is interested in going can apply for this trip. So we’re two of 12 people going on this trip.”
During the African trip, Gentry and Burch will go to Uganda and learn how World Help, a Christian humanitarian organization, changed lives through child sponsorship.
They will also go to Rwanda, which has the Rwanda Genocide Memorial. In 1994, the Rwanda Genocide killed over 800,000 people. They will visit the Village of Reconciliation.
“World Help has a huge sponsorship program for children, so we’ll be involved with that while we’re there, hanging out with kids, playing with kids and learning more about the sponsorship program,” Burch said.
Last year, Montgomery City resident Destiny Shaw, who is a junior at Missouri State University, went on a one-month research trip to Africa. It was her first trip outside the United States.
Both Burch and Gentry are excited to represent Montgomery County at the African trip in five months.
“I was born and raised in Montgomery County,” Burch said. “To some, that’s insignificant. I’m a Montgomery County girl and a country girl. But for God to use me on the other side of the world, it’s just such a blessing to be a part of that to be able to go there and use your gifts that he has given you to bless other people and come back and share about it.”
“We can’t wait to see what God does and we can’t wait to come back and share it,” Gentry said.
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