Gulf Coast 2006

Our partnership with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) began in the summer of 2006 with a week-long mission to the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Sixteen students and four adults from the Eastern Shore set out on July 8th to join 200 other students and YWAM staff in Sulphur, LA. We set up our base camp on the floor of a local church, which would serve as our home for the next seven days.

We began our mission with training, preparation,and worship. It included a slide show of images from before Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, followed by images of the devastated landscape after the storms. The show helped to prepare our hearts and minds for what we would soon witness first hand.

Despite the activities that we participated in to prepare ourselves, the drive to our first mission stop was unimaginable. Bulldozers had already been hard at work demolishing structures that were beyond repair, creating piles of dirt and rubble along the road's edge. Yet despite the demolition work, the fields still remained littered with what used to be personal belongings. Everywhere we looked we saw the many layers of sorrow, strewn across miles and miles of landscape.

Our first stop was Holly Beach, once a thriving Gulf-front community. All that we saw was a deserted stretch of white sand. One lonely trailer stood in the distance. The only work that could be done was to offer our prayers, so we gathered together in small groups and asked for peace for the people who used to live here, and we asked for a fresh start for those who were still left. We prayed for God to help us complete all of the work that we hoped to do that week, and that we would be worthy representatives of the hope offered to all people through Christ.

The afternoon was spent working in Cameron Parish, where we helped sixteen year old Julie rebuild her community. We spent the afternoon clearing debris from what used to be the front yard of a house. As our rakes upturned the earth, you would often hear a team mate announce their finds.

"Look! It's a teddy bear!"

"Hey - this cell phone is still in its original packaging."

"I found a photo. Do you think this person used to live here?"

In two hours, we were able to clear about 25 square feet of debris. It didn't seem like much, but it was important, life changing work. This brief experience taught us powerful lessons about the true value of material possessions compared to family and friends, and also how blessed we have been in our own lives. We gathered to pray again, for the people who used to live there, for the things we had seen and done.

On Tuesday, we turned to the town of Sulphur. The residents of the area had returned to their homes after the storms, but they had chosen to live within the damaged walls of their houses. It was like they were now unwelcome guests in the town that they used to call home.

Our team was assigned to the home of Mrs. Thelma Suarez. We simply called her Mrs. Thelma, with much love and adoration. She lived with her granddaughter, Kimberly, who she had raised since birth. They shared a bunk bed and a bathroom in their modest home. During our three day project, they were gracious hosts, always willing to share their tea and converse with us when we needed to take a break from Louisiana's sweltering hot summer sun.

We came to Mrs. Thelma's house with a short to-do list, which quickly ballooned. We expected to repair some siding, replace the bathroom floor, and patch up the leaky roof. What we discovered was termite-ridden siding, broken plumbing, and extensive water damage. The amount of work that neededto be done for our new friends was overwhelming, but we knew that with God's strength that we could do more than we ever thought we were capable of.

During our mission, we gave every bit of ourselves to give Mrs. Thelma and Kimberly everything that the needed. We repaired the roof, treated for termites, and re-sided the entire house. The bathroom floor was so rotten that one of our members fell through it, and the extensive water damage extended into the hallway. We also discovered that the fixtures were no longer salvageable, so we had to replace those, as well. The additional workload was overwhelming, but we learned to place these burdens upon God and we received the strength necessary to do the work that we were called to do. We yanked, sawed, hammered, nailed, plumbed, tiled, painted, and cleaned our way towards a suitable home for Mrs. Thelma. The cost over-runs of this project were significant, so we emptied our pockets and phoned our families and friends during our breaks to find the money that we needed to finish our job. In the end, we even found enough money to buy Mrs. Thelma an air-conditioner, the one thing that we missed the most during our days of heavy labor.

In this midst of all this construction, we always found time for prayer. We would gather together in a circle that included Mrs Thelma and Kimberly. We would thank God for all that we had done, for the days of sunshine, and that we were able to find enough supplies to complete the tasks given to us. We asked for continued health and safety, and for the beautiful new home for Mrs. Thelma and Kimberly.

Our team arrived in Louisiana with a lot of determination and a strong work ethic. YWAM provided us with a group of dedicated missionaries to guide, work, pray and worship with us. The partnership helped our team to experience a kind of transformation that we had never before witnessed or felt. We knew that we would be transforming landscapes on this trip, but we had no idea of the extent that God would transform our own lives.