Katrina Relief Mission

February 5th, 2006 at 02:01pm Brian

One month after Katrina ripped through the gulf coast I had a chance to go down with a church group to donate some time.  Below is a lengthy journal of what our Leader John had documented from the trip.

In the coming week I will be posting some pictures from the trip along with my stories that I have to share. 

Katrina Relief Mission IV

 

God really does work in mysterious ways, He answers prayers, He is all-powerful, and he does have a sense of humor. The cool thing about God is that he accepts everyone and His gift of eternal salvation is free to all that ask. Understanding God is truly a lifelong journey that does not end until, I assume, you reach Heaven.

Through my experiences in the Gulf, my personal faith has grown and crystallized. It is rock solid. Doing God’s work and following His orders gives me a sense of presence with God that I have never experienced before. It calms me (and to those of you that know me, that is a big deal) and assures me. As bizarre as it sounds, I too, thank the Lord for Katrina (see previous posts and Pastor Fairly’s prayer) and how this disaster has drawn me close to him.

It has been just over six weeks since Hurricane Katrina roared into the Gulf coast. Things are not ok. Things are not slowly getting back to normal. The area still looks like a war zone. Recovery from a war takes years. Recovery from Katrina will take years; years of hard work and support from many people. My point is this, the media has moved on and Katrina is no longer front-page news, but the devastation is still paramount. People are still displaced, destroyed homes have not been rebuilt, and people are suffering. Folks this real, it is in our back yard, and it is not going away.

Please remember these people in your daily prayers and support any effort that you can today and in the future.

I can’t say that these trips are becoming routine for me, but I can say that I am conditioned for them. Other than logistical planning, I can be ready to go to the Gulf in 20 minutes. I have learned not to worry about the trips, just plan and execute and God takes care of the rest. I am always excited to meet the people that will participate in the mission, as I know God has sent them and they possess unique talents that reveal themselves to me and to others during the trip. I also know that conversations and incidents take place that I am not even aware of that change lives.

Katrina Relief mission IV left with six men Thursday at 7PM, picked up two additional team members in Ohio and sped off into the night.

Now I have a confession to make; I don’t like Fords. I have avoided them with the exception of Paul’s truck on the second mission. This trip I reluctantly agreed to take one along. Through the night, I kept looking in my rear view mirror watching the Ford struggle to keep up with the two Chevys. I almost felt sorry for it, kind of like you feel sorry for a lost dog. Little did I know that this truck would prove invaluable during the trip. We named the truck “Big Red”.

We arrived in Gulfport at noon on Friday. St. Johns was jumping; the place looked great, the relief supplies were flying off the shelves and it was clean and organized. The work that we had done on previous trips was paying off.

Our first task was to tarp the back part of the church to keep the rain out of the useable rear section of the building. Everyone likes projects that require you to be on the roof; something about being 30 feet in the air with power tools that is exciting. For me it shows God’s hand at work securing these men and guiding their every step and keeping them safe.

So while the majority of team worked on the church, Chad and I ventured out into the neighborhood to do additional work. We started working on Dollie Smith’s house where a large tree had fallen in her back yard, demolishing her shed and pretty much making a big mess of the place. We started running chain saws cutting away at the debris. It was a large tree with a lot of vines and the shed was metal so it was a tricky project. After a while the rest of the team showed up and we split again to work on other project in the same area. We finally got this tree removed and the debris from the demolished shed cleared but we still had this huge stump that actually had an old chain link fence going through it. After some discussion we decided that this was a job for “Big Red”.

After snapping a tow strap we borrowed some chain, a worker down the street just happened to have some, (thanks God), and chained the stump to the truck and started to pull. That poor truck pulled and pulled and I kept thinking “typical Ford”. But neither the truck nor the team was ready to give up. I finally said “20 minutes and were all done”. Well the truck kept pulling and Craig and Ted kept cutting away at the stump. Then finally with a groan and a heave, this 30”+ stump came out of the ground. It was a victory for the whole team and “Big Red’ earned its place.

It was time to end the workday so we loaded up the tools and we headed for Ocean Springs and Woodhaven Baptist Church. I took the team down to the ocean front to give them an idea of the magnitude of the storm. We ended up driving the ocean front highway all the way from Gulfport to Biloxi.

I never get used to seeing the damage that ravaged this coastline. The mood always shifts to somber when people see this for the first time. Words simply cannot explain it. Again, please pray for these people, they have lost everything they own.

We arrived to a hot meal at Woodhaven. It was about 7PM, 24 hours since we left; the team had been either driving or working that entire time so everyone was pretty whipped.

They nice ladies who prepared the meal for us had been waiting there since 4:30PM. I thanked them and then told them that we came to work and we work a full day. During the course of the meal I asked the ladies if they had anyone from their church that needed work done. After some prodding, Ruby said she did have a friend who had a tree on her house but it was probably beyond our scope since a couple of other crews had looked at it and said there was nothing that they could do to remove the tree. Well, Craig and I looked at each other and smiled knowing that that was just the kind of work that we were looking to perform.

So after dinner, Craig and I went for a little ride to look at this “tree” with Ruby but it really didn’t matter because I think we both had already decided in our hearts that we were going to take this job. It was well after dark when we arrived and all we could see was a 9-foot root system and this 26” wide pine tree laying long ways on a doublewide modular home. Not knowing entirely what we were getting into we said we would be back first thing in the morning to get started. We then noticed the John Deere Tractor, complete with an articulating shovel sitting in the yard. “That thing run?’ we asked. “I think so,” said Ruby as the homeowners were still at work. “Good, I think we might need it”, I replied.

I could tell that the wheels were turning in Craig’s head as we made our way back to Woodhaven. After we returned, everyone started to drift off to bed for the night. The crew was up early the next morning and the conversation “buzzed” (sorry) about the “Big Tree” on the house while Joe and Patti prepared an awesome breakfast for us. After a brief Mississippi shower, we loaded the trucks, prayed, and headed off.

On every trip there is always one project that defines the trip and this was going to be it. In the daylight, it was quite clear what we got ourselves into; the tree was an 85-foot pine, suspended over the house and beyond. To give you an idea of the size of this mess, when we were clearing away some debris to have a proper working spot we found a 1969 Firebird!!! Jack, the homeowner and an older man with a heart condition, came out to greet us. We asked him again if the John Deere ran, he said, “yes, I believe it does and fired it up” What was significant about this was that on the property there had to be at least 20 cars, an old bus, 6 or more old mobile homes and/or campers, motorcycles, boats, motors, refrigerators, etc… and I am quite certain that this old Deere tractor was the only thing that worked. (Thanks God, could not have done the job without it.)

We immediately got to work and Matt shimmied up to the crown of the tree, (and it was a long way up there) and started to devise a plan to section the tree. Slowly the tree started coming down. We tied off sections of the tree, cut and lowered the pieces to the roof. We then either threw them off the roof or rolled them into the bucket of the tractor. As each section came off, the crew cheered.

Again, God had blessed the team as 8 strangers came together and worked seamlessly, supporting each other and worked together solving problems as they arose.  After about three hours we divided the team and half the crew headed back to Gulfport. It was important to keep our commitments to the Gulfport neighborhood that we have been led to serve. Craig, Matt, Chad and I stayed behind to finish the big tree. It was hard to split the team, as I knew that everyone wanted to stay on that job.

We finished sectioning the tree and pulled the last 12-foot section away from the house with the tractor. Things got a little tense for a moment and Jack’s eyes grew wide as that tree trunk started pulling the tractor backwards towards the house.

After we were through, we had a quick lunch and started to load up the truck. Jack came over to thank us and went on to tell us that tonight will be the first night that he will be able to sleep since the storm hit as every night prior he would get up every 15 minutes to inspect the tree and make sure that it had not shifted or moved. Doing God’s work is a humbling experience.

As we drove towards Gulfport the other crew called and said that they had a real mess on their hands and that they needed help. Well after pulling down an 85-foot tree there wasn’t much else that could intimidate us. We arrived at the next home and found no fewer than 5 trees down at the rear of the house and a couple more that needed to come down. Within minutes we had 6 chainsaws and 2 sawzalls running and in less than 90 minutes we had cut and stacked all the debris in the yard.

It was almost 5 PM and it was time to prepare for our return trip. We went back to St. Johns and help move a few things around while Pastor Fairly’s wife prepared dinner for us. BBQ chicken and more red beans and rice. It was awesome. After some brief fellowship, we prayed and started driving north. I was a little concerned about the drive home because several members of the team, myself included, were just physically exhausted. God again prevailed and unique talents were revealed as a few of the crew drove pretty much the entire way home, a couple without sleeping at all. As Sunday dawn broke I thanked God for again leading us home safely. We walked into second service unnoticed, other than possibly the smell, and listened to Chris’ message.

I thanked God for the success of the trip, thanking Him for leading such a talented group of people to me and marveled again at how the unique talents afforded us to accomplish things normally out of reach for most.

I prayed for more direction for future trips.

My faith being rock solid on this, I knew it would be only a matter of time before God led me to where he wanted us to go.

Fast forward to Wednesday afternoon and I walk into the A2 conference in Chicago and sit down in a 7000-seat theatre for the afternoon session. At the first break I turn around to meet the people behind me. Two pastors from two churches in Gulfport, Mississippi!!

It really is a privilege to be involved in something where your faith grows so strong that you are enabled to move forward confidently knowing that God is lighting the path at your feet and directing your each move, and you simply “Follow Orders”.

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