Gustav Recovery

We all arrived back this weekend to discover minimal damage here in New Orleans. Our church facility has one tree and one portion of the fence that were damaged. The tree is fixed. The fence will hopefully be taken care of this weekend. 

We immediately began assessing the needs in our body after the storm. It seems like we have needs that range from unskilled cleanup to skilled repairs. We asked our body to fill out this form in order to let us know that their needs were as well as how they could help meet other's needs.

This Satuday we will be gathering at church to go out and help others in our city. We will meet at 9am, work until around 1pm and then eat a hot lunch together. If you are a church member, and would like to be involved, please let me know.

Thank you to all of you around the country for your support, prayers and phone calls. They are much appreciated. As I watched Gustav disintegrate in the Gulf of Mexico, I couldn't help but wonder if your prayers had anything to do with it.

exactly what we needed

Well, it's Tuesday morning. Gustav has moved on. We are all still evacuated and waiting for the OK to come home and see things with our own eyes. While no levees broke, it sounds like we could come home to find downed trees, fences or roofs. Right now, I know that the church property has lost one fence and one tree.

As I think over the past three years, so many faces flash before my eyes. My pastoral heart has been broken to see so many hurting on an emotional level. Those wounds were torn back open by the collision of the Katrina anniversary and the Gustav evacuation.

We gathered on Saturday night to pray. We prayed for our people and for our leaders. We prayed for God to intervene and turn the storm.

We asked God, "why?" Perhaps this is exactly what we needed.

Evacuation forced us to re-live many of the emotions and moments of Katrina. It hurt so badly that it caught us off guard. After all, that was three years ago.

We needed this. We need closure. We are ready to move forward. God has much to do in this city. We as a church need to be ready to dive in and be used by Him.

Maybe this is exactly what we needed.

So many seeds of the Gospel have been planted over the past three years. As many of you who have come down on work teams know, we believe that revival will flood this city. We have been waiting. It it has seemed as if God needed something to occur to trigger the outpouring of His Spirit.

Maybe this is exactly what we needed.

I believe in a God who has a firm grip on the winds and the waves. He intended for Katrina to decimate New Orleans. He intended for Gustav to scare us to death. He is moving us toward the Kingdom of God. I trust Him. He knows exactly what we need right now.

Post-Gustav plans

It is noon and so far it looks like the greater New Orleans has by and large been spared by Gustav. BUT, we fully expect to come home to find some houses through the metro area affected by wind damage. I'm sure there will be trees down, shingles missing and perhaps even some wet carpets.

Coincidentally (huh?), we really don't have many work teams scheduled for the month of September. So, if you feel the itch to come down in the next couple of weeks to help out with the initial aftermath, we would love to host some teams!

Feel free to contact me now via email or cell phone (504-975-7570) if you are interested. Obviously, things won't be abundantly clear until we get back into the city to see the damage with our own eyes. We will keep you updated.

Sam Update

Whats happening, well here is a little update from me. We decided to leave NOLA earlier then we had planned. We got on the road about 10pm. We arrived in Jackson, MS around 3am. Not bad. We got to our hotel and saw signs posted everywhere say No pets allowed, NO EXCEPTIONS. As you can imagine, It brought me to tears. They said this last time, when we evacuated for Katrina, then they told us we could bring him in our room. But this hotel opened 5 days ago, and they have white comforters, so mom didn't see that happening this time. I prayed, I know God is in control. I kept telling mom... watch tomorrow they are gonna change the rules. I just know it. I told her not to worry. Dad slept in his company van with Cubby. What a good man. We got to bed around 5am and woke up 8am. Mom and Dad brought Cubby to a vet where they boarded him. I always get sad to leave Cubby and it puts stress on mom and dad when im upset. Around early afternoon the replaced all the "No Pet" signs with "Only pets 25lbs or smaller" Mom went to the front desk and talked to the man and talked to him, Cubby should be around 25lbs, hes just really fat :) He said it was their headquarter policy, it wasn't up to him. Then i punched him in the face. Im just kidding. My mom asked about federal laws, he said yes, if she could find it, he would call him manger and tell him. then she started to tear up and the man told her he could stay with us! YAYYYY. God is good! Just something as small as having Cubby with us has made everything so much better. Less stress, less tears! Im so happy.
I just stayed in bed all day, occasionally dozing off. When I woke up i felt like i was at home, then i heard the tv with the news on. I just couldn't believe this is happening again. its crazy to me.
We walked over to the Bass Pro Shop, really cool. They have a shooting range arcade type game. That will be good if we need to blow off some steam later. haha We are also right across the street from the Mississippi Braves baseball field. They are a AA team. Jon and Dad went to the game last night, they had discounted tickets for LA residents.
Just laying in bed right now watching the news. Everytime they say Westbank or Harvey Canal we turn the tv really loud, and yell at everybody to shut up. Or ill punch them in the face...just kidding.
Im going crazy with my camera being broken, but im taking lots of video, can wait to make a DVD! I took these with my phone at the Bass Pro Shop.

Hurricane Gustav

Hey there! Well we seem to have a little something brewing up in the gulf. I’ll try to update this blog as best I can throughout the next couple of days, or weeks. Hopefully just days. Here is an update with what’s going on with me. I drove in Friday afternoon with my roommate. I left my car up at school in Hammond. Jonathan drove in after the LSU game. We’ve been packing up the essentials and moving things up stairs. Mom, Dad, Jonathan, Cubby and me will leave for Pearl, MS (right outside of Jackson) around 2 or 3am. Our hotel is right next to the Bass Pro Shop, looking forward to that! From the things I’m hearing it not looking to good for the Westbank. Oh well, whatever happens, happens. God is in control. I can’t help to thing about our Africa trip this year and all the kids I met there, and the state of their houses. I’m so blessed to have a nice house, my own car, a computer, all those things. And if I come back and my house has however many feet of water in it....it will be ok. It was all in God’s plan. Just like Katrina was in the plan. And we have seen great things come from that, people getting saved, people growing closer to God. Not to mention the amazing work teams. I personally got the chance to meet hundreds of people from around the country that came here to help the city. I’ve made so many friends in the past 3 years. It’s so cool to see people come to nola and go home changed. Well I’m gonna go finish up my packing, and do some praying. If you need anything you can send me an email SamIam0911@yahoo.com .

Sam

Edgemont Bible Church

A blog by Lucky Wagner from Edgemont Bible Church…

What a wonderful and blessed trip we had to New Orleans. Berean NOLA was a fantastic host and kudos to Samantha and Pastor Doug for the hospitality and having families ready for us. We had opportunities to witness to a lady where we did some work and she made a profession of faith. The first house where we worked had two girls, ages 7ish and 11ish, and what a delight they were. They wanted to help and enjoyed doing so.

The highlight(s) of our trip was working VBS at Fischer in the evening. All of us enjoyed the interaction with the children. We helped in various classrooms, with the singing by playing guitars and the keyboard, and in counseling. It was a blessing to us to help in that area.

The historical trip Lawrence took us on was extremely informative and eye-opening to all of us. The overview of New Orleans before the trip was very beneficial, the explanation of why the levees broke and which ones broke, and why we heard so much about the ninth Ward.

We enjoyed the interaction with the other groups and being able to worship on Sunday morning with the church body. Hosting other churches that travel to New Orleans to assist in the rebuilding of New Orleans is a great idea.

On our way home we talked about continuing this ministry in the St. Louis area with the elderly and have begun to do so. Other ideas were to have a first and second responder team to help with disasters such as hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes. Thank you Berean for “loving your neighbor as yourself”.

Lucky Wagner
Edgemont Bible Church

Fischer 5 Day Club

Berean Fischer 5 Day Club
June 16-20

For the first time since Katrina, Berean hosted Fischer 5-day Club at Fischer Charter School. We had been sending work teams to the community of Fischer for the past 3 years. So we have stayed connected but had not been involved as a church for a while. It was great to get back out there with our church family. The kids as well as the adults had a blast. Eileen Daspit was the director and did and awesome job! I worked in the 11-year-old classroom as the classroom coordinator. Doug was the Bible teacher and Colin and Rob were helpers. I have some pictures I took, yes I know, they’re mostly all of my class, but you get the idea.

Much thanks to all the work teams that have helped at Fischer, you have helped us stay connected to the community and the children.


-Samantha