Wish List

We have had inquiries as to a wish list for tools, equipment the team needs or may need for future deployments. Here is a list that is a work in progress. In the near future I will formalize this list by type of equipment/ tools needed and priortize the list. But for now here is the needs/ wants list:


Satelite Internet Dish system

A/C Unit for Trailer

110 electrical hook-up for trailer

ToolBox (large drawers on rollers)

18V power tool set

Commercial Stove converted to propane

3 Sink wash system for dishes (retrofitted)

Hotwater Heater 30 ga or larger(propane)

Awning for Trailer (16-18 ft)

10 ea. Shovels, Rakes, Brooms (push),

2 Doz pair of Safety Glasses

3 turkey fryer burners

6 Commercial grade chainsaws (asst sizes)

3 PAIR OF CHAINSAW CHAPS

3 Chainsaw operators safety helmets

6 Doz pair of leather gloves

2 Doz pair of rubberized work gloves (orange)

40 ft of e-rail for trailer interior



Pray for God to provide for this work

Buddy

National Outreach Convention

Greetings from San Diego . . .

The NOC started tonight with a talk from Rudy Carasco, a hispanic evangelist in Los Angeles. He reingnited some fires within me tonight. He challenged us to stay in our communities and build bridges from the church to the community. Great point! That's what it is all about. On Halloween night, several hundred from the community crossed the bridge onto our church property. Over 50 info packets were given out and 520 meals were served, not to mention a couple hundred pounds of candy handed out.

We live in an exciting time for ministry.

keep building bridges,

Buddy

Katrina Relief Trip Report

This Sunday we will give our report to the congregation on Sunday Morning and Sunday Night. Sunday Glenn and I will tag team as we look at numerous slides of the trip. on Sunday Night we will use the video we shot as a springboard for the class. Wayne and Sheila are firming the dates for the next trip, which will be some time in November, most likely the second or third week. I have had conversation with Hilltop this week and the work is progressing well in Slidell.

The Machens are extending their carport to provide a larger assembly area for the anticipated weather change. People from all across the nation continue to show up to help. What great work God is doing through that family.

Keep on responding with God's Love,

Buddy

Family Promise Week

I have many people ask if I was gearing up for Wilma. The answer is no. . . However, from the sidelines I will be prayerful for those affected and for those who will respond. My heart goes out to those who are in harms way. Let us keep them in our prayers and thoughts.
Our next response project is one week away. The tranisitional families will be at Davis Park from Sunday to Sunday beginning Oct. 30th. If you can help let me know. We need overnighters, cooks and hosts in the evening.
Remember our three pronged outreach. Locally, Regionally and Nationally.

Keep responding with the love of God,

Buddy

Team Meeting

There will be a team meeting on Thursday night at 6pm at the building for everyone who was a part of the trip. For more info call Buddy

Reflections. . .

After being home for a few days I thought it would be good to share some thoughts on the Relief Trip. First, I am proud of the Response made by Davis Park for the people of SE Louisanna. I do not mean this in a prideful/arrogant way, but rather a good feeling about the relief trip, that we sensed it was the right thing to do and God blessed us. Also, I have a feeling of loss. The fact that our enviroment is not filled with debris, muck and other chaos makes me feel bad because I could not do more for those who have lost so much. It seems unfair in a wierd way that I have a whole home to come to here in Modesto. I identified better with the locals in Slidell when I spent the night in the tent. Last thing is I am happy to be home. Home with Krista, Matthew and our extended church family. No matter what issues we have, I know we are blessed by God. I am not sure if this makes sense, but this is where I am tonight.

more later,

Buddy

Trailer and Drivers arrive safely . . .

Around 4 pm the cargo trailer and drivers arrived safely. Ron and Max were a sight for sore eyes. It was good to see them ok after a scary blowout of the left front tire. Both wives arrived about the same time as the trailer, all had smiles on their faces at the reunion. Just a few more tasks to complete this trip. I will make contact with the Smiths and Corely's to see if they are close to home. Keep them in you prayers.

It is good to be home. . .

It is wonderful to be back among family, friends and the normal surroundings of Modesto. Relief work has a wierd topsy turvy nature that gives one a since of the temporal nature of this place. I prefer to think things are solid and firm, even though I know they are not really that way. I am expectantly waiting to see the trailer and truck pull in sometime today. Ron and Max are my heros, I was willing to drive the 2200 miles home, but my o my I was tired. I cannot wait to here their stories fromm the rode. Reflecting on the trip it was good to see our response to the needs of SE Lousianna. People needing hope were brought some by willing Christians from Davis Park. I am thankful for the many talents exhibited while we were serving at Hilltop. In a few days we will have a Team meeting to talk it all over and see what other's impressions were, then we will record what worked and what did not for the next trip. I'm gearing up for the next trip whether it is our neighborhood or across the country. I cannot wait to attempt to make a difference, one person at a time.
More to come later, I will start posting pictures and videos as I have time.

Buddy

Home Again. . . .

Oct. 15, 2005 . . .

The Mission to Slidell is getting close to finishing. Last night at midnight I knocked on the door and found the loving arms of Krista. Man O Man the hugs and kisses felt good. I almost pulled off the suprize. Upon arrival in SFO I had some frantic voicemails very concerned about my whereabouts. Krista was relieved to know that I was only an hour from home.

Team Red is an awesome group. We mucked houses, cooked breakfast and drove tractors like no other team has ever done. (my own biased opinion).

Next time? You bet! Spreading God's Hope through personal touch ministry is touching and awe inspiring. Seeing God work through crow bars, hammers, respirators, safety glasses and conversation with the owners of devasted homes is a humbling site to behold.

The most impressive part of Team Red is that each member always did what ever tasked they were asked and then went the extra-mile to make sure nothing was left out or left behind. Team Red stayed focused and remembered that it was not all about the muck and breaking out of sheet rock, but remembered the task was to be light for Christ. To Team Red, each and everyone of you, Thank you ! Thank you !

Time now to spend time with Matthew(Krista was called in to work).

Remember to pray for the drive team with the trailer, Ron and Max are finishing out our team's task by bringing home the cargo trailer and Darren's truck

Buddy

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety-Jog

Day One: Slidell, LA to Childress, TX.
Day Two: Childress,TX to Barstow, CA--eighteen hours. It looked for awhile that we might make it all the way home in two days. Alas, it's farther from Flagstaff to Barstow than I thought.
Day Three: Barstow, CA to Modesto, CA, arriving 11:00AM. We did not break the speed limit, but I found sometimes that we were bending it a little.
I thought I had made the trip easily, until I got a look at myself in the mirror this morning. Who's the old guy with the baggy eyes?

Travel was uneventful (no accidents, but we saw some doozies), with many conversations about what the adventure meant and how the next one (and there WILL be a next one) can be made even better.

Team Red was much more efficient than other work groups because of the quality of our team leaders (think "sergeants"), and the existing relationships among the team members. If we go again, we will need to provide enough sergeants to handle our own teams as well as the pick-up teams that are available from other places. (If you were there, think of Jesse Kenyon--Navy SEAL--as a team leader of miscellaneous strangers. He would have them working together without clashes in about ten minutes.) Strangers need time to form relationships, and a venue to do so. Group "games" look like one good way to foster this kind of interaction.

Jack

Turn Out The Lights . . .

Winding Down is the best description of where the team is emotionally and physically right now. We survived the closing ceremonies with a few tears and a lot of laughs. Its always strange to start the retreat home after working in a community for a few weeks and living among so many wonderful volunteers. In camp last night there were 43 campsites running the full spectrum of small tent to 43 ft. Coach.

Yesterdays job brought the work crew to Waldron Joseph's mother-in-laws home. There were many rich smells in the air and some interesting construction techniques used by the owner/builder. The crew did their best and worked safely in some harsh conditions. The house will probably never be occupied again . . . but our people spent time in consolation and nurture of the Mrs. Joesph.

Everyone s traveling today . . . keep us in your prayers


Buddy

The Stewart Home on Stanley Street

Our crew wanted a job that they could interface with the family . . . yesterday they got their wish. The Stewart family rode the storm out in their house on the bayou. Why? Because their eldery neighbors did not have anyone to care for them. These people risked everything for their neighbors and friends. Water got 7.5 ft in their home, they were worried and anxious for many hours until the waters finally started to subside. The problem they faced was lingering water, it stayed for days and days. Everything in the lower house was ruined.

Family interface . . . The Stewarts are dealing with many emotions. Loss of possesions weighs heavy on their minds, additionally they are dealing with the death of their 28 year old daughter, who died in a tragic auto accident. Compunding this is her husband will not let them see their grand children. Our team responded well to the task of personal nurture. They sat, listened and hugged this family and at the end of the day Rose Galloway prayed with the family.

The crew is out on a tough job this morning, out near Waldron Joesph's house. The crew looked tired this morning but are out hard at work on the final day. We pull out tomorrow. The Redshirts came, saw and did battle with Katrina, our goal was to leave a little bit of Jesus behind. I know that has happened.

The drive team will lunch today in Albqurque, NM. Keep them in your prayers.

Buddy

More Leave for home . . .

8:00 am cst . . .

The drive team left this morning for Modesto. Jack, Art, Bob, Helen and Pam are on their way home. They all had smiles as they pulled out and hit the road. I heard folks in the crowd mention more redshirts are leaving. There will be a void on the work crews today, but God continues to provide a healthy stream of volunteers from all over the US. We have met volunteers from Maine to Washington.
Today Rick gets to muck for the first time. I cant wait to see him come covered in mud. Tina is working with Walt the facilty manager today. Last time I saw her she was driving a small tractor with two thumbs up and a big grin on her face.
Today I may load up supplies and take them to churches that were in the path of Rita.
Darren' s truck is still holding together. We have used it to do a multitude of tasks. In Chalmenette, we used it to pull a Dodge truck out of the back yard at a residence. The Dodge had been under eight feet of water and was sporting a lot of muck and straw. I know the Ford smiled as it pulled the Dodge truck out of the yard.(Thanks Darren)
Not many days left of this adventure, time is flying by. Thoughts of home are everyones mind. Keep us in your prayers,

Buddy

Reentry

Reentry into Motown.

Triple hazelnut nonfat latte. Clean streets. Children laughing. No more smells of rotting decay in the air. Parking lots without FEMA trailers. Absence of Red Cross ERV sirens. Normal life.

I woke up at 5 a.m. this morning, the same time I've woken up every day for the last 10 days. Ready to work; ready for an assignment to a work crew. As I lay in bed, I prayed for our team. For safety, for God to be honored. But no work detail for me. Only thing on my agenda today was resting and playing with my girls.

As I think about all of the physical, emotional, and human loss that I've seen, I count my blessings. My infinite blessings...

Looking forward to seeing all of the team again soon.

Glen

Winding Down

Tuesday--the last day for five of us (Bob and Helen, Art, Pam, and me).
Pam and Helen helped at Camp
Art and Bob went out with a mucking crew. Afterward, Tina said, “It was the worst yet.”
“Even worse than yesterday?”
“Yes! Rose and I were nearly gagging at the smell all day.”

Rick Kelly and I were assigned to deliver new appliances to hurricane survivors—refrigerators, washers, dryers, and kitchen stoves. We were the muscle for one of the elders from the local congregation. After we made the final delivery, he insisted on taking us to lunch. We both told him that we were cheap dates—no need to spend much money on us. He took us to his favorite seafood restaurant, where we chowed down on a po’ boy and a bowl of red gumbo, respectively. Yummy!

In the morning, we plan to break camp as soon as we can see what we’re doing, then hit the highway after breakfast. The plan is to arrive sometime Saturday.

Don’t stop praying for us,
Jack

Ken's House and other thoughts. . .

Many on the crew went to Ken's house yesterday. This house had nearly 8 feet of flood water. Flood water brings lots of things with it, straw and mud are the worst culprit. The first task was to bust down the garage door, no remote control(no electricity)the door was taken out in pieces. Behind the door was an incredible amount of mud, around 18 inches of it. The crew attacked it and the sheetrock in the house, then came in from the jobsite at 3:30. Our crew can work!

Brenda Smith is a great servant. She has taken a shed full of stuff and turned into a workable warehouse full of food and cleaning supplies. Jim, her husband has been working maintenance around the "outpost". Monte and Sharon Corley from Manteca are out mucking on a different crew, Monte was promoted to crew leader today.

Rick Kelley arrived at the airport yesterday after delays in Denver. We retrieved him from the airport on the second attempt late last night. Today he is with Jack Hairston delivering new refrigerators to people in the community.

Yesterday on the airport run I turned off into the streets just east of the Superdome. Litter still remains on the highpoints in the road where people sought refuge from the flood waters. In the 50 block area that I drove around it was very eerie. It was a complete ghost town. We only saw one family looking at their home. One family in an area with thousands of homes. Cars scattered like Monoply pieces all over the place. At one convience store a person was obtaining supplies! The other spooky part, all the homes have search marks. A circle with an x inside it. The information in the circle tells of casualties, date and what group did the search. The height of the mark on the house shows the level of the water when the rescuers were there.

More random thoughts to come later. . . Keep us in your prayers.

Buddy

I am counting down the days till I get home.

Motel 6

Left Slidell at around 1 p.m. Needed gas, so we went to the station. No luck. After 3 tries, we finally found a gas station that not only was open, but had fuel as well. Whew. It would of been a long walk to Alexandria!

Driving west on Interstate 12 & Interstate 10, and north on I 49 was an eye opener. The further west and north we went, the more normal everything started to look. No debris piles. Stores were open. Traffic was light. Gas stations had gas. Even though it was a short drive of about 240 miles, we still had to pull off the road and take a 30 minute nap. As the adrenaline of the week wore off, fatigue started to set in.

Got into Alexandria at around 5 p.m. First hotel we tried was fully booked with displaced victims of the hurricanes. Oh no, I thought, not again. But the second hotel we tried, the Motel 6, had one room left. We took it. We looked forward to beds, indoor plumbing, air conditioning, and clean towels! (Not to mention we had to go back to Outlaw's BBQ for some good 'ol southern Q. Really, we had to!)

The startling thing about this hotel was that it was occupied by families, just like any urban apartment complex. Children were running up and down the halls playing tag, laundry was hanging from the railing, and men and women were grouped together talking, laughing, and passing the time away. Many hotels in Louisiana are now the primary housing for displaced victims of the hurricanes. This makes it inconvenient on those traveling through the state----sometimes it's just impossible to find a vacancy at any of the hotels.

(I wonder what the long term housing solution is. Permanent housing at the Motel 6 isn't the answer, but it'll have to do for now.)

Louisiana and the south has many problems to overcome; I didn't have the energy to ponder the possibilities nor the solutions. My eyes were too heavy...sleep came easy and quick. Before I knew it, it was time to go to the airport.

Glen

Chainsaw adventures

Today at the morning meeting where everyone is assigned to a work team, my name was not called. When I asked to be assigned, I was attached to Jack Attack, a chainsaw team under the leadership of Jack Watson. Besides Captain Jack, we had two sawyers (Brian and Brent), and two laborers (Dino and me). Neither Dino nor I could not touch a chain saw because we had not taken the required safety course before being assigned to the team.

Our first task was to go to Pearlington, MS. The area had taken a hit from a 30-foot storm surge. Marsh grass was still draped over the telephone cables along the road.

Our job was to get a fallen tree off a septic tank so FEMA would install a mobile home and hook it up. While Dino and I raked fallen pine needles and branches off the area where Walt, the owner, thought it might be, Brian and Brent made short work of the fallen tree and Jack picked up the pieces with a John Deere Skidster--think of a Bobcat on steroids--8,500 compact pounds of front loader/fork lift.

Back at camp, we wolfed a quick lunch and took off again to rescue another house.

The house sits back in the woods about a quarter mile from the highway. It looks like a set from a horror movie--thick trees covered with vines. You can see only about twenty yards in any direction. A large oak tree had fallen across the car port, crushing it almost onto a Jeep. The tree had fallen among other trees, akin to a giant game of pick up sticks, but ready to crush the unwary.

The first thing we did was to pray for protection, and for God's vision of what each tree would do after we made each cut. Captain Jack and his Magic Skidster dragged the reluctant Jeep to safety before we started working.

We started with an oak about ten yards away from the main tree. As Brent started to cut its trunk, he telegraphed his intention to just whack it off. This would result in a tree kicking back--jumping off its stump toward the sawyer. I suggested that he cut a wedge out of the opposite side of the trunk, leaving a hinge for the tree to pivot on as it fell. What a quick learner! He left a perfect half-inch hinge and the tree fell just where he intended, with no kick back.

Then we needed to cut off the top limbs off the mighty oak. The first leaned toward the roof. I described to Brian how cutting a wedge out of the side of the limb would pivot it away from the roof. He cut the angle perfectly, and the limb dropped six inches away from the edge of the roof.
The second top limb leaned really far over the roof. Merely cutting a wedge out of it would not be enough to make it miss the roof. Captain Jack had several lengths of chain and cable, which we hooked to the top of the branch. Jack took up a strain on the limb with the Skidster. That force, coupled with another sidways wedge cut out of the limb, caused it to fall away from the house.

Just then, Captain Jack's phone rang. He needed to go back to camp to handle delivery of vehicles on a flatbed semi. He declared that I was the new supervisor, and left. Oh great. I can't show them how to do the task, but only explain how in words.

Next was a bay laurel (source of those fragrant bay leaves in your spaghetti sauce) that was leaning toward the car port. A wedge cut into the trunk, and another perfect hinge, caused it to fall harmlessly on the driveway.

Now we were down to the main trunk of the big oak and a very large side limb that rested on a corner of the house. There was no way to keep the end of the trunk from landing on the roof. If we sawed off long lengths (say, six feet at a time), the mass would go right through the roof. After scratching our collective heads, Brian noticed a couple of sheets of plywood around back. We put one on the roof to spread the shock of the slice as it landed. The other sheet was leaned up in front of the windows next to the front of the house, because oak rounds bounce farther than you might think possible.

After each cut, we would discuss where the next cut should be made. It took awhile to trim back the trunk, because there were about 10-15 rounds to slice off, and because there were many suggestions about the best spot to cut, with predictions about where it would land.

At the end of the day, the partially-broken carport had been pounded into the ground, but no windows had been broken. When we quit, the main trunk of the oak still leaned against the house, and the lowest side limb still rested against the corner of the roof. No one could figure out how much of the weight was still being carried by the roots partially in the dirt.

Everybody came home without injury. Tomorrow, I'll try to get a real expert to take a look at the situation to tell us the best way to attack it.

Jack

And Away They Go . . .

Glen and Jerry pulled out first today and headed for Alexandria. Man, they will be missed! Glen is an inspirational sparkplug and Jerry knows how to work hard. Jerry talked last night about being here this year because God healed him last year. People prayed and helped him and now he has been able to give back. Treat others like you want to be treated. Great wordsm from him and great words from God.

Oleta, Brian, Paul and Lynn are on the plane and heading for Mo-town. We had a great discussion on the way to the airport. They are great servants of God.

I am constantly thinking of my family in MODESTO. All of your prayers keep us going here. Keep it up.

Serving him,

Buddy