| Ministry in the News |
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| Stafford County Sun Aug. 3, 2001 Beauty on the inside . . . and out Message of hope spread around the world By CAROL THOMAS HORTON Stafford County Sun SPOTSYLVANIA - "There's a difference between going to church and really living it," says Spotsylvania resident Janice Hollan, who not only shows her faith through church attendance and prayer, but also through her actions. Hollan, 49, shares her message of hope and faith through J.H. Ministries-a Christian mentoring and speaking program, which she began in February after seven years of training, prayer and planning. She speaks to groups both large and small. Most recently, she traveled to Asia with her message, and hopes to travel to Russia and Korea this fall. "I always had a desire to make people feel better about themselves," Hollan says. As a teenager, she was trained to be a hair designer and still works part-time at Salon 2000 in Spotsylvania County. Her ministry has operated, thus far, on donations-but she hopes to bring in more speaking fees in the future. Her seminars often include demonstrations in hair-designing, skin and nail care, and make-up application combined with this simple message: God didn't make any junk. Hollan also will visit those in local hospitals and nursing home patients who need a pick-me-up. She will style their hair, bring a small gift and share her faith. But Hollan's message reaches far beyond the local area. MESSAGE OF HOPE FOR CHINA While others trembled at the thought of going to China during the May conflict of a downed American spy plane, Hollan braved a privately-sponsored mission trip to the land of panda bears-bringing Bibles and hugs to those living in poverty and under restrictions. "I truly felt what it was like to walk with God," says Hollan who doesn't speak any Asian languages. "War could have broken out [in China] at anytime." Traveling with several others-mostly women-Hollan flew to Thailand. The group took 11,500 Bibles and 35,000 Christian tracts stored in boxes. The literature, written in Chinese and Burmese, is not allowed in those countries but customs inspectors never checked the contents of the boxes. The mission team boarded the bus with guides and began a 10-day excursion of faith. As they journeyed, the group prayed silently for those around them. "I looked into the people's eyes and I saw love and I saw hate," Hollan says of her journey in a land where Americans are not often welcome. Still the people were hungry for news from the outside world. To bring the Christian message to the Chinese, outreach missions had to be performed between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. Christian tracts were left on doorsteps by small groups of mission-team members dressed in dark clothing with their hair covered. This is called "booming tracts." Hollan and her teammate spent an evening "booming tracts" and watched as one man picked up the literature, read it silently and began to smile. Another man on a bike followed them and picked up one of the tracts, then waved to them and smiled. "He was smiling like a child receiving his first gift," Hollan said. "But all we could do was smile back. We couldn't acknowledge that we had dropped the tracts." As they headed down a dark alley, leaving a trail of tracts, Hollan and her teammate accidentally came upon an open door and lighted room. "It was the police headquarters," Hollan says. She and the other woman stopped the distribution of tracts and continued down the street as if they were taking a walk. "The officers came out and watched us all the way down the street," Hollan says. "You cannot even speak the name of God or Jesus over there." BRINGING LOVE TO BURMA "Americans have nothing to complain about," Hollan says after seeing bleak poverty and stifled freedom in Burma, now called Myanmar. Boarding her bus one day, a woman with worn and scaly skin approached Hollan. The woman carried a small child and motioned to her mouth-indicating hunger. Hollan gave her a dollar. "She took off waving the dollar in the air like she had a million dollars," Hollan says. "An American dollar is worth eight dollars in Burma." Later, Hollan learned from her guide that she shouldn't give money away because beggars would swamp her. So she began making small purchases at street markets. "I tried to get money into their hands any way I could," Hollan says. In Burma, the mission group was permitted to feed 900 young Burmese boys in a Buddhist temple. With heads shaved and faces somber, the orphaned boys were training to become Buddhist monks. "We fed them rice, and a beef and vegetable mixture," says Hollan, who visited several Buddhist temples during her trip to meet with young children. "I remember one little girl blew me a kiss and I went up and hugged her," Hollan says. "After she left, I cried because I could tell from her smell that she had been sleeping with the animals." AMERICAN DREAM Far from the poverty of Asia, Hollan's ministry to American girls is quite different. She recently conducted a series of four classes at Spotswood Baptist Church-where Hollan is a member-relating inward beauty to outward beauty. "I speak to the heart first," Hollan says. "I tell them we are all beautiful right from the beginning." Describing herself as a once-shy teenage who is now married with three grown children and a grandson, Hollan lays a foundation for her students to build confidence in themselves and security in their faith with God. She discusses hand and nail care with the girls and relates it to the importance of touch in caring for one another. In another class, the youth compare the living waters in the Bible to the waters on earth. Hollan points out the importance of water in skin care. She includes a lesson on sun protection and offers testimony of how she was cured of a spot on her skin that contained cancerous cells through her faith in Jesus. Hollan's skin-care lesson also includes a chance to experiment with a little make-up-an opportunity most young girls would find hard to turn down. In the final mentoring lesson, Hollan talks about hair care. "Our hair is our identity," Hollan says. "People recognize us by the color and style of our hair." Various other church groups-as large as 100 people or more-also have invited Hollan to speak about hair care and the beauty she says God gives to everyone. And she hopes more churches will call her to speak. "Hair is our crowning glory," she says. Trained in Christian mentoring by Marilyn Hickey Ministries in Denver, Co., Hollan says it is faith and prayer that has brought her to the point where she can speak to others about not just outward beauty, but inward happiness and joy. "How you endure the pain of life is through God's love," says Hollan, a native of Georgia who was raised in the Seventh Day Adventist Church. "It's not a denomination. It's a relationship with Christ." J.H. Ministries may be contacted at (540) 898-4230. Janice Hollan also accepts letters, prayer requests and donations at P.O. Box 3883, Fredericksburg, Va. 22402. |
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