Dear Friends
Well after a lot of mudding, sanding, mold remediation and painting Friday is here. Its hard to believe the week is over. We have accomplished quite a bit but of course there is still a lot of work to do. Today the mudders continued with second coat and sanding. The Bartholomew family's house is ready for the next group of volunteers to come in and finish up the dry wall. Imagine after three years they are only a few weeks from returning home. How wonderful! The other team completed work on Mary's house yesterday and were sent off in smaller teams. One group collected trash in big trucks and made several trips to the dump. Others worked on mowing large overgrown yards (in 100 degree temps) and a team of wonderful women continued with mold remediation in other locations. One of the team members commented these smaller jobs are more challenging because it's hard to see your progress. It feels like your not accomplishing much. I can imagine those who work here everyday can get that feeling as well. When you look around the SBP it is easy to think we are not accomplishing much. When you consider that only 1/3 of the families have been able to return to St. Bernard Parish (about 8000 people) and there are still many houses marked for demolishing, one could be overwhelmed. Are we really making a difference?
Mother Theresa once said "We can do no great things; only small things with great love." Working in New Orleans reminds us that God works yes in mighty ways but also in small loving acts using the likes of people like us. We may have not rebuilt the St. Bernard Parish but we made a difference in the lives of a few families....
...and isn't that why we are all here? Jesus is speaking and saying "What ever you did for Mary and the Bartholomew family - you did for me." May God continue to bless these folks and New Orleans as richly as they have blessed us!
Tonight, even after an extremely hard days work we had a group take off for a Zepher's game. Some stayed and cleaned up the church. Tomorrow we take off bright and early. We look forward to being Back Home Again in Indiana.
Traveling Mercies
God Bless
Carolyn