Saturday, everyone hit it hard for their last day working

The Lubbock crew didn't get back till 9:00 at night. They planned to knock off at 3:00 and see the beach since they had been working in Galveston, only blocks from the water all week and hadn't gone, but they ended up unloading a surprise 18 wheeler of food and supplies from Nashville at the Broadway Church and got to the ocean about dark.

The Harding crew cleared Walter's house in San Leon and his yard, what I thought was more than a day's job. They finished by noon! After having lunch on the shore of Galveston bay, they headed down to Galveston to pick up more door to door work with the Lubbock crew. They have a professional journalist in their crew so I hope to have more links to post on their work for his stories and pictures soon.

The Northside Christian team spent a third day at Sharon and Brandon's house helping her to sort her stuff and part with that which is not recoverable. You can imagine how painful this can be to throw away all you have...

There is still an entire lot of fallen trees she owns next to her home that we have to clear.

The 4th group for the weekend was a "young marrieds" (or almost there) group from Prestoncrest Church of Christ in Dallas. They cleared the home of Jerry and Connie in Shore Acres. I walked in and they introduced me, but before they even got my name out, Connie had worked her way around the stuff piled in the room and grabbed me for a hug.





They both had tears for the hearts of the crew that had given their time to help them out.

I drove through the neighborhood since I hadn't been there yet. It's just as bad as San Leon. Chalmette type of Neighborhood, but the houses right on the bay are battered and one burned badly during the storm. Of the 640 homes in the burg of less than 1500 residents, 575 had at least four feet of water.

Friday was a good day to work

We added 18 Harding students to the volunteer base Thursday night. They started on three tree jobs for a church member, Jeanie, and two of her neighbors, Connie and Ms. Francis who live in Santa Fe. They brought out an enormous pile of branches from Ms. Frances' yard where several trees went down.
They also removed a tree that has been leaning on Jeanie's roof since the storm.


They cut up a large tree with a 2' trunk and another large tree in Connie's back yard.

And Jeannie fed them all really well!


The Lubbock crew worked more in Galveston while the Northside Christian crew continued working in Shore Acres.

I surveyed San Leon, checking out a request for help with a house that had lost a wall to the waves to make sure it was safe for volunteers. While there I found 91 year old Walter trying to get his storm door off the back addition to his two story house.

The wall had slid off the foundation in the waves and was leaning at an angle that made the door hit the eves when it opened. I removed the door and the extremely water logged exterior door he had already pulled off and left leaning in the doorway. The opposing wall was leaning the other way and the structure seemed stable, though it was obviously not sound. More on the crew clearing his house on the Saturday posting.

I dropped contact information with a couple of churches near the area, the post office, where the postmaster said her 81 year old father needed help, and another relief operation working at the Maranantha Baptist Church there in San Leon.
They fed me a great lunch. Committed relief was heading back to California Saturday and a new group is moving into the flooded, soggy, recovering church.
The entire area is heavily damaged. Much like the 9th ward after Katrina.




The first row of homes that received the bulk of the wave action are heavily damaged, or moved off their foundations. Large boats are in yards. Newer vacation homes are mostly up on stilts and were not badly damaged, but many full time residents' homes are small, built on the ground, and not well maintained. There were quite a few "yard sales" going on where everything was set out on the lawn to dry out...


Some people are living in tents.

Thursday started out Rainy

Really rainy! That didn't slow down the volunteers though.

The Northside Christian Church group started on Sharon and Brandon's house in Shore Acres.

Brandon, 16, really hooked in with this group coming back for dinner with them Thursday night and helping them on another house on Friday.
That Job was for Phyllis, also in Shore Acres.

They worked the weekend on Sharon's home as there was so much to be done.






and they had some fun in the Gulf checking out the damage to the beach homes in Galveston



The Lubbock Christian group spent their whole weekend doing work around Galveston with the Broadway Church of Christ. They cleaned up around the building, unloaded truckloads of mattresses and food. Served 900 meals a day to the community, and mucked out six "or more" houses. Or more, because they would move from one place to the next doing small jobs for those who needed help as well.

Photos from Houston Work 10/15 - 10/19

Jeff Smith

Bill Thomas

Mechelle Meyer

Robin Emerson

Amy Pyles

Houston Relief Update

I've been in Houston for a week and a half now managing the Hilltop Rescue operations on the ground. We have been VERY busy. There is a lot of need here and we are receiving volunteers. We can use more! The need is real and the work is stacking up. here's the story.

Hilltop has been on the ground since right after the storm. We surveyed the area and and found a definite need for outside volunteers. The local community has responded amazingly well, but local volunteers are drying up as people get back to their lives after giving days or weeks of their time. The need is greater now for outside volunteers. Between our own requests for help and those going unmet by other relief organizations in the area there are hundreds of work orders to fulfill.

This past weekend, we had 62 volunteers in from Harding University in Searcy Arkansas, Northside Christian Church in Tulsa, Prestoncrest Church of Christ in Dallas, and Lubbock Christian University. They were awesome workers and amazing people to work with. Some would have been happy working day and night.

We completed 14 jobs mucking houses and clearing downed trees from yards over the weekend as well as getting a lot of small side jobs done for neighbors of those we were working with, or just driving down the street and asking who needs help.

The worst hit areas where we can work are Galveston, San Leon, and Shore Acres. Areas on the Bolivar Peninsula (across the mouth of the bay from Galveston) are still off limits and most homes were completely washed away in those towns. Those areas are marked by yellow and red on this map respectively.

Wind damage to trees covers a much broader area, but is pretty much confined to the Galveston Bay area.

Our operations in Houston are being hosted by the Clear Lake Church of Christ. We are 20 minutes from most of the hardest hit areas. We have 42 real mattresses, 6 showers, plenty of bathrooms, a huge kitchen, and a gym we can use if it isn't being used for other purposes. We have a pool table, fooseball, and air hockey! We have plenty of tools for volunteers to use in their work, a 15 passenger van, a pickup truck, and two tool trailers to haul tools around in as well. This place rates 4 stars compared to the flooded school buildings, tents, and MASH showers we've had in the past. The church has basically turned over the back third of their building, their youth area, to us to use as long as there is a need.

The church has been awesome! The elders and church leadership have been overwhelmingly supportive of our operations to help them reach out to their community and responsibly spend the funds they have collected for the work. This is a place where "real Christians" prevail as the hands and feet of Christ. We are only supplementing what they are doing in their community. The youth group continues to work mucking houses in the area and church members made some fabulous dinners for our volunteers this weekend. I am personally quite impressed with our partners here.

Like the man said "Come on in boys! The water's fine!"

Servants Unite!

John McGuire

Pictures from Galveston Today

are at this link

And Pictures from the Northwest Church in San Antonio last week are at this link.

Our Farvorite Hero!

CNN has whittled down their list to 10 heroes for 2008. I wouldn't even mention that here, but one of them is a friend of ours. Liz McCartney, cofounder of St. Bernard Project is one of the finalists! We worked for them Christmas time, 2006 right after they set up shop. Now they've completed rebuilding 120 homes and are hitting it harder than ever. Give Liz a click to vote for her at this link.

Back in the Lone Star State

Servants Unite has 1 volunteer in Texas working for the next two weeks. Me.

I arrived in time for lunch today (Sunday), just as the closing song was being sung here at Clear Lake Church of Christ where Hilltop's camp is set up. I'm relieving Stan Cunningham from Northside Church of Christ in Nashville as camp manager when he returns home Wednesday.

Our hosts are awesome! We have new showers they built in for volunteers, real mattresses, great kitchen facilities, and some of the nicest people... but most everyone we've worked with who is willing to do this kind of thing has been that way.

We're spending the next couple of days arranging work for two large groups that come in Wednesday and Friday staying through the weekend.

You are still needed! There's a lot to do down here and a lot of hurting people that need to see you caring for them in their crisis like you did after Katrina. I know I've been home with you the last three weeks since Ike came in and we're all focused on our falling retirement savings, scared about our jobs, and fretting about who's going to win the presidential election. Please take this opportunity to break out of the worries of this world that are bogging you down to focus on eternal goals by being Christ's hands and feet to those here who have lost everything.

Since the media, (except for the Houston Chronicle) is off on other things, I'll be reporting on what we find the whole time I'm here. Please follow the blog and look for email updates over the coming days and prayerfully consider whether you can take that time away from your worldly fears for the refreshment that comes from working in the Kingdom.

Servants Unite!

John McGuire

First Ike Video

To see the work being done in the Houston area and the work left to do, see this video on YouTube. Jeremy Glover, the youth minister at Clear Lake Church of Christ, our host church, put this together.

Survivor Storm Stories

From the Houston Chronicle.

16-year-old Jerrith Baird searched for his 58 year old Grandma via kayak the day after Ike and found nothing but a few of the pilings that held up her house and submerged vehicles of his friends.

Mike Anderson was washed 14 miles inland with heaps of debris, an ordeal that lasted 36 hours.

The current count of those missing is over 400. Many are listed here.

Prayer Requests for Mark Day

Mark flew to Houston today to help June White of Hilltop Rescue set up camp. Your prayers for Mark and our Hilltop partners are earnestly requested.

Ike Missing

After seeing the devastation and hearing of the lack of evacuation, I've been afraid we'd see this story emerge. The Houston Chronicle has posted a list of 331 people who have been reported as not seen since Hurricane Ike. http://www.chron.com/databases/ikemissing.html

From the home page of the data source:

The Laura Recovery Center is providing a hotline to report information on people missing as a result of Hurricane Ike. This data is actively shared with appropriate law enforcement agencies.

When using this data, please consider that things are still very confusing in the wake of Hurricance Ike. Some data may be inaccurate or incomplete. Please help us improve this data. We are updating and verifying the data as our resources allow.

Hilltop Rescue Release on the New Camps

Dear friends,

I'd like to introduce you to a family from South Louisiana. They are Cajun by birth, with a long and rich heritage of Louisiana traditions. They are a hard working family who enjoy the blessings of good Cajun cooking and the fellowship that goes with great food, good family and faithful friends. They've seen many hurricanes come and go through the years, yet they keep rebuilding their lives each time, refusing to leave the area. They recounted that, when the twin hurricanes Katrina and Rita roared through their homes three years ago, they found hope and help from some new friends at the Maplewood Church of Christ in Sulphur, LA. As I spoke with the matriarch of this family, tears formed in her eyes and a lump caught in her throat. Even after three years she still finds it a bit difficult to talk about the wonderful young people who came to her home to muck out the filth that Rita had left behind.

For the past three years this family has continued to rebuild. not just their homes, but their entire community. This past week we all stood side by side on the muddy floor of their son's home. He had completely remodeled it, tearing out walls and replacing them with beautiful wood columns, tongue-in-groove paneling, and a solid wood kitchen bar. It was coming along beautifully when Hurricane Gustav blew into town. Amazingly, they were all kept safe as that storm blew by the coast and tore into the inland areas around Baton Rouge. This proud Cajun family sighed a big sigh of relief, praying that God's mercy was available to those who were not so lucky. And then, a week later as Hurricane Ike headed into the Gulf, they all held their breath once more. With mixed emotions they watched as Ike headed for Texas, and they once again felt like they were safe. They had no idea that Ike's sheer size would drive a wedge of water into their homes once more.

We joined Brian Spicer, the minister of Maplewood Church of Christ in neighboring Sulphur, and arrived once more to see what aid could be provided. Proud, and putting on a bold face, we heard the shake in her voice and saw the tears in her eyes as she challenged her family to rise once more to the challenge of rebuilding their lives. Hilltop Rescue has heard her challenge, and recognized that her plea is echoed throughout Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas. As we begin the process of answering that call, we are praying that you also hear it. Are you willing to go into the heart of disaster, either in Louisiana or Texas? Are you ready to help change other's lives, and have your life changed in the process? Our new friends need you. Sign up today!! If you are unable to go, please consider a financial donation. And, above everything else, keep us all in your prayers. (This message was sent to me by Stan Cunningham, a member of Hilltop staff who spent 6 days driving in southern Louisiana and Texas to assess damage and talk to hurricane victims.)

Partnering with the Maplewood church in Sulphur and with the Clear Lake church of Christ in Houston, we are setting up two volunteer camps which will run at the same time. We are stepping out in faith that God will provide volunteers and supplies needed to keep both operations running. Our focus will be smaller communities where aid is not as available; and just like always, our priorities are the elderly, the handicapped and disabled, single mothers, and those without resources. There are many families like the one described above in need of help. Will you join with us in meeting this need?

Sincerely,
June White
Director of Communications
Hilltop Rescue & Relief

www.hilltoprescue.org

Time to Hit the Road!

If you’ve been following our survey results last week on the blog, you know we need to be responding to Hurricane Ike. If you haven’t you can get the details here. In short, this is no Katrina. People have food and water and a place to stay. Neighbors are helping neighbors. There is a large area of destruction though and outside volunteers will be essential to helping many start their recovery.

Now that most of us have power back and have taken care of Ike’s damage here, we are ready to send a team as early as this next Saturday morning, September 27, 2008. Our long time partners, Hilltop Rescue are setting up two camps to help cover the 200 miles of gulf shore affected by this storm. One between Houston Texas and Galveston at Clear Lake Church of Christ will be ready for volunteers Sunday evening. The other near Lake Charles Louisiana at the Maplewood Church of Christ will be ready for volunteers Monday, but it will be rougher accommodations to start out.

It’s time for Servants to Unite! Please find your part in the following list of needs

• Please forward this notice to your friends, family, and church family.
  
• Start organizing people you know would be interested in this opportunity and pick a date to join a team. To sign up or ask quesitons, email john@servantsunite.org.
  
• Consider donating to cover expenses, and talk to your church leadership and missions team about contributing to our financial needs of shipping people to Texas to work for a week.
  
• We have a special need for people with plumbing skills in Houston ASAP and people in Lake Charles with construction skills. This task is to help prepare facilities for volunteers who will be working there over the coming weeks.
  
• We need team leads to step forward and vehicles for teams to use.
  
• We need your prayers for the success of our mission, for the safety of our volunteers, and for the faith of those we are going to help.
  

Teams will leave on Saturday mornings, travel two days (20 hours) to Houston, or to Lake Charles (17 hours) arriving on Sunday night, work Monday through Friday, and travel home two days the following weekend. Overnight stops will be with our friends at University Church of Christ in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, the halfway point on the trip.

• Teams will go every other week for the next 6 weeks and on demand after that.
  
• Ike team 1 September 27-October 5
  
• Ike team 2 October 11-October 19
  
• Ike team 3 October 25-November 2
  
• Special teams may be ran by request for special group circumstances.
  

You will need the same clothing and the same basic tools we have had in New Orleans and Iowa work. Those are listed in the volunteer link on www.servantsunite.org.

Donations may be made by mailing a check (please identify yourself in an accompanying note) to 5511 Copenhagen drive, Westerville, Ohio 43081, or using the Paypal link on the blog and web site. Servants Unite is a 501(c)3 non-profit which makes your donations tax deductible. 100% of donations will go to the care and feeding of volunteers working in the disaster zone. Primary expenses are fuel, food, vehicle rental, and support of our hosts’ expenses to have us.

Normal retail and other stores and restaurants are open in the areas where you will be staying. This is not the uncertain circumstance we went into right after Katrina. You will be staying in safe suburban neighborhoods. The people you will be working for will be extraordinarily grateful for your sacrifice of a small portion of your life for them in the name of our Lord. And just like those we’ve met in the New Orleans area, people are just ridiculously friendly and happy just to have someone listen to their story.

More information and updates as they are available.

Servants Unite!

John McGuire

Cleaning up Churches of Galveston

This link is a photo gallery of people on the island already cleaning up the churches in Galveston.

Crystal Beach Before and After

The Houston Chronicle has a set of recovery photos here that include these before and after aerial shots of Crystal Beach.

Last Man Standing

Probably the most shocking Ike aftermath picture is of the only house standing on the ocean side of Gilchrist. Compare that to what was there before on the google map satellite view of the town on the Bolivar Peninsula.

View Larger Map

This Story on CNN.com is about the people who lived there and their experience.

Ike's storm surge last week devastated the Bolivar Peninsula town, flattening most of the roughly 200 homes there. The couple's yellow house at the beach -- supported 14 feet off the ground by wooden columns -- was the only house on Gilchrist's Gulf Coast side not to be flattened.

"As we got there, the tears started flowing," Warren Adams, 63, said Thursday after his first visit to the home since evacuating. "There's a yellow house sitting there, but that's all. It was devastating."

Ike Photos

A friend of mine emailed this link today. This is all the stuff Mark and I were unable to see, either because flooding had receded or we weren't allowed into areas.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/09/the_short_but_eventful_life_of.html

Here's a link to the few interesting pictures I took this week. The way this storm came out, it's either really bad, meaning we couldn't go see, or it's not so much worse than here.

New News Links

National news isn't covering much from Ike, but I've changed the newslinks to the right to focus on this event. The Houston Chronicle is a great source.