THE IMPACT OF BROADBAND: MILLENNIALS ISSUE
Recipe for success
Martin Coffeehouse building libraries one cup at a time
BY LISA SAVAGE
A
phrase common to missionaries can describe John and Courtney Sellers: Your mission is wherever you are.
Eighteen months ago, the couple opened the Martin Coffeehouse so the people of the city could enjoy a cup of coffee while raising money for literacy projects in Nepal. For every cup of coffee sold, 10 cents goes to literacy projects. With more than 50,000 cups sold so far, the couple has built their first library in Nepal. “We’re so excited to see the success so far,” John Sellers says. John and Courtney Sellers opened Martin Coffeehouse 18 months ago.
12 | January/February 2019
WHY NEPAL?
Missions are nothing new to the Sellers. John Sellers grew up in a family of missionaries. His aunt and uncle were missionaries to Nepal, and he learned early in life the Nepalese children were doomed to failure without better educational resources. But tragedy changed his family’s course in Nepal. His aunt and uncle were killed in a plane crash several years ago while serving in the third-world country, and his grandparents eventually took over the mission in Nepal. Six years ago, his parents flew to Nepal, and they are now also missionaries. “I grew up hearing about Nepal all my life,” John Sellers says. “I always knew that was going to a big part of my life.” Courtney Sellers, too, grew up in the mission field, going wherever her father’s evangelism took the family. The couple met in college at the University of Tennessee at Martin and learned they had much in common. John Sellers proposed to her while in Nepal, and they were married three years ago. “I wanted Courtney to see Nepal before we married because it’s such a huge part of what defines my life,” he says. While their heart is in Nepal, they also wanted to have an impact at home. “We struggled with how we could make an impact there, while making an impact here, too,” he says. The couple first started a faith-based nonprofit organization, Letters in Motion, to support literacy projects by delivering school supplies and letters of encouragement to children in schools, orphanages and children’s homes. More than 15,000 letters have been delivered. WK&T Telecommunications Cooperative
