TravelingLight
September 16th, 2005, 05:43 PM
The Lord gave me the opportunity to go to the Mississippi gulf coast to be a part of the effort to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina. It was a heartbreaking and heart warming experience. The devastation is unbelievable. But what the Lord is doing down there is so, so awesome. People are coming from all over the county and rolling up their sleeves and saying 'what can I do to help?'. I have never seen anything like it in my life. We hear so much bad, but there are still so many good and caring people and God is using them in a mighty way.
Another lady and I were dropped off in Pascagoula to help in that area and the men in my group went to Biloxi to do chainsaw work. One day we helped a lady clean out her house that had gotten four feet of filthy water in it. Then we worked distribution. Handing out food, water, toilet paper, shampoo, baby items, cleaning supplies, etc. Wonderful opportunity to have one on one contact with the people and hug some necks and tell folks they were being prayed for.
The damage in Pascagoula is primarily flood damage. In addition to the ocean surge they had flooding from the Pascagoula and Singing River. The water flushed out the sewage lagoons and was very contaminated. The director of missions for Jackson County Baptist Association (who we were working with) told us the bacteria in the city water was 48 thousand times higher than considered safe.
It is heart breaking to see everything in the homes piled up on the edge of the street waiting to be picked up. The whole town looks like a landfill. The best way I know how to describe it is - it looks like some one had a war in a landfill. Once the homes are cleaned out they will have to be rebuilt from the inside.
We got to go down to the sea wall on a very short stretch of Hwy 90. The lady driving us has lived there 38 years, yet it is so destroyed by the surge she could not tell us where some land marks had been. We passed by where Senator Trent Lott's house had been and she said she could not show us exactly which house it was because it was just gone to the point she couldn't recognize it. Along Hwy 90 nothing is left except the slab where the house was. And Pascagoula is not even the most hard hit.
I am sure there has been some problems with looting, etc. in Mississippi but nothing like in New Orleans. The people I saw had the sweetest spirit. They seemed humble and grateful. They had lost all their material possessions and had waited in a hot line for hours to get a few basic items, yet many were worried about us, the relief workers, being too hot.
I would ask them could they use this or that and they would just quietly say, 'yes, I lost everything'. I did not see any pushing or shoving. If I offered then two of some item, many would say 'I can get by with one, save the other one for someone else.'
This was folks with black skin and folks with white skin. I know racism is mentioned in New Orleans and I can't speak for there. But from the bottom of my heart I tell you what I saw. I didn't see black or white people. What I saw was hurting people. They were all in the same situation. That water destroyed all their homes and it didn't pick and choose. And they all had such a sweet spirit about them.
I saw people of both races driving ratty old cars you would think would not make another mile and I saw people of both races driving expensive SUVs. And they had all been reduced to waiting in line for a couple rolls of toilet tissue.
We saw lots of folks living in tents in their front yards because they can't stay in their houses. We even encountered a couple with no tent that had been sleeping in lawn chairs.
They are only beginning to clean up. The work will be going on for months. The Jackson County Baptist Associaton office stopped taking names when they had reached 900 homes needing a 'mud out'. That is where they go in rip out the furniture and carpet. Tear out the sheet rock above the water line and spray the house with Clorox. Some of the guys from a church near Jackson, MS were working the mud outs. Those men were precious. They came in one day hot, tired, and filthy. But they had found a lady with breast cancer and who was on chemo and had no help with her house. They ate a quick sandwich and headed back out with flashlights to clean her house because they couldn't leave it undone with such a need.
In Pascagoula there was much activity by the Southern Baptist Disaster Relief teams.The Geogria Feeding Unit fed us as we worked the distribution center at First Baptist Church of Pascagoula. I saw the Mississippi Feeding Unit, the Alabama Shower Unit, and the Temporary Emergency Child Care Unit from Ohio all set up at First Baptist Church of Biloxi. What a blessing to see the way the Lord is working through these teams.
In addition to the trained groups, many teams from various churches were on site. I had the wonderful opportunity to meet and work with brothers and sisters in Christ from all over the country. They came from everywhere. What an experience.
People are open to the gospel and coming to know the Lord through this devastating storm. We got the opportunity to give out tracts and Bibles. I know of two ladies and one man who surrendered their lives to the Lord during the time our team was there. One was a truck driver from New York who was hired to deliver a trailer truck load of ice to First Baptist Church of Pascagoula. He was sitting on the parking lot of with his truck while the ice was being given out each day. He had been there six days and the chaplains on hand had been witnessing to him and planting the seeds of the gospel. On Saturday afternoon as we were closing up for the day one of the ladies on my team talked with him and he ask Jesus into his heart as Lord and Saviour. The chaplains planted and she was blessed to see the harvest.
I would like to share this story that showed me just how much God cares about even the smallest details of our lives. I was working on Saturday and Sunday at the huge distribution center set up in the parking lot in front of the church. The people would drive through and talk to a chaplain first who would fill out a slip showing how many families they were picking up for and circle what items they needed (cleaning, hygiene, food, baby items, etc.) Then they would drive by and we would hand them what we were responsible for and move them on down the line, bumper to bumper. (416 cars came through on Sunday alone)
If we got a box with miscellaneous items in it we took out what we were giving out and would take the box down to who ever was distributing the other items.
I was giving out toilet tissue and hygiene items such as soap, shampoo, toothpaste. A lady stopped, I looked at her slip and ask could she use this and that. She said 'yes' and then quietly said 'I have a 86 year old lady in my house. Would you have any adult diapers?'. I had not seen any, but said 'let me look'. I turned around, took three or four steps and a girl comes running up with a box, drops it in front of me and says 'can ya'll use some Depends?'
Our God is so wonderful, so real, and so loving. He looked down among all the chaos and saw a little lady with a basic human need and met it.
I saw so many times where He seemed to multiply the items coming in. And I heard others say the same thing. It was like the fish and loaves in the Bible where He just multiplied what was needed. He is doing a mighty work out of the devastation. Praise His name.
Another lady and I were dropped off in Pascagoula to help in that area and the men in my group went to Biloxi to do chainsaw work. One day we helped a lady clean out her house that had gotten four feet of filthy water in it. Then we worked distribution. Handing out food, water, toilet paper, shampoo, baby items, cleaning supplies, etc. Wonderful opportunity to have one on one contact with the people and hug some necks and tell folks they were being prayed for.
The damage in Pascagoula is primarily flood damage. In addition to the ocean surge they had flooding from the Pascagoula and Singing River. The water flushed out the sewage lagoons and was very contaminated. The director of missions for Jackson County Baptist Association (who we were working with) told us the bacteria in the city water was 48 thousand times higher than considered safe.
It is heart breaking to see everything in the homes piled up on the edge of the street waiting to be picked up. The whole town looks like a landfill. The best way I know how to describe it is - it looks like some one had a war in a landfill. Once the homes are cleaned out they will have to be rebuilt from the inside.
We got to go down to the sea wall on a very short stretch of Hwy 90. The lady driving us has lived there 38 years, yet it is so destroyed by the surge she could not tell us where some land marks had been. We passed by where Senator Trent Lott's house had been and she said she could not show us exactly which house it was because it was just gone to the point she couldn't recognize it. Along Hwy 90 nothing is left except the slab where the house was. And Pascagoula is not even the most hard hit.
I am sure there has been some problems with looting, etc. in Mississippi but nothing like in New Orleans. The people I saw had the sweetest spirit. They seemed humble and grateful. They had lost all their material possessions and had waited in a hot line for hours to get a few basic items, yet many were worried about us, the relief workers, being too hot.
I would ask them could they use this or that and they would just quietly say, 'yes, I lost everything'. I did not see any pushing or shoving. If I offered then two of some item, many would say 'I can get by with one, save the other one for someone else.'
This was folks with black skin and folks with white skin. I know racism is mentioned in New Orleans and I can't speak for there. But from the bottom of my heart I tell you what I saw. I didn't see black or white people. What I saw was hurting people. They were all in the same situation. That water destroyed all their homes and it didn't pick and choose. And they all had such a sweet spirit about them.
I saw people of both races driving ratty old cars you would think would not make another mile and I saw people of both races driving expensive SUVs. And they had all been reduced to waiting in line for a couple rolls of toilet tissue.
We saw lots of folks living in tents in their front yards because they can't stay in their houses. We even encountered a couple with no tent that had been sleeping in lawn chairs.
They are only beginning to clean up. The work will be going on for months. The Jackson County Baptist Associaton office stopped taking names when they had reached 900 homes needing a 'mud out'. That is where they go in rip out the furniture and carpet. Tear out the sheet rock above the water line and spray the house with Clorox. Some of the guys from a church near Jackson, MS were working the mud outs. Those men were precious. They came in one day hot, tired, and filthy. But they had found a lady with breast cancer and who was on chemo and had no help with her house. They ate a quick sandwich and headed back out with flashlights to clean her house because they couldn't leave it undone with such a need.
In Pascagoula there was much activity by the Southern Baptist Disaster Relief teams.The Geogria Feeding Unit fed us as we worked the distribution center at First Baptist Church of Pascagoula. I saw the Mississippi Feeding Unit, the Alabama Shower Unit, and the Temporary Emergency Child Care Unit from Ohio all set up at First Baptist Church of Biloxi. What a blessing to see the way the Lord is working through these teams.
In addition to the trained groups, many teams from various churches were on site. I had the wonderful opportunity to meet and work with brothers and sisters in Christ from all over the country. They came from everywhere. What an experience.
People are open to the gospel and coming to know the Lord through this devastating storm. We got the opportunity to give out tracts and Bibles. I know of two ladies and one man who surrendered their lives to the Lord during the time our team was there. One was a truck driver from New York who was hired to deliver a trailer truck load of ice to First Baptist Church of Pascagoula. He was sitting on the parking lot of with his truck while the ice was being given out each day. He had been there six days and the chaplains on hand had been witnessing to him and planting the seeds of the gospel. On Saturday afternoon as we were closing up for the day one of the ladies on my team talked with him and he ask Jesus into his heart as Lord and Saviour. The chaplains planted and she was blessed to see the harvest.
I would like to share this story that showed me just how much God cares about even the smallest details of our lives. I was working on Saturday and Sunday at the huge distribution center set up in the parking lot in front of the church. The people would drive through and talk to a chaplain first who would fill out a slip showing how many families they were picking up for and circle what items they needed (cleaning, hygiene, food, baby items, etc.) Then they would drive by and we would hand them what we were responsible for and move them on down the line, bumper to bumper. (416 cars came through on Sunday alone)
If we got a box with miscellaneous items in it we took out what we were giving out and would take the box down to who ever was distributing the other items.
I was giving out toilet tissue and hygiene items such as soap, shampoo, toothpaste. A lady stopped, I looked at her slip and ask could she use this and that. She said 'yes' and then quietly said 'I have a 86 year old lady in my house. Would you have any adult diapers?'. I had not seen any, but said 'let me look'. I turned around, took three or four steps and a girl comes running up with a box, drops it in front of me and says 'can ya'll use some Depends?'
Our God is so wonderful, so real, and so loving. He looked down among all the chaos and saw a little lady with a basic human need and met it.
I saw so many times where He seemed to multiply the items coming in. And I heard others say the same thing. It was like the fish and loaves in the Bible where He just multiplied what was needed. He is doing a mighty work out of the devastation. Praise His name.