Return To Haiti (Calvary Community Church of Port Towsend)

We are back in South Louisiana! After a long night of unexpected delays in our travels, we made it to Live Oak Baptist Church. It has been refreshing to see familiar faces. It feels like a family reunion. 

We can't wait to see what the Lord has in store for us again this time! 

After settling in, we had our orientation meeting where we got to hear stories from Joyce and Gary, our host partners, of the strength and resilience of this community after Hurricane Ida and of the amazing God stories they have witnessed while following God’s call. It was so encouraging and we are so thankful to be able to be a small part of rebuilding people’s homes here in the bayou. After orientation, we set out to our project sites for the week to assess what we need and will be working on. We wrapped the night up with some jambalaya and white beans and some worship and reading Colossians 1. We are excited for this week!

Pointe Aux Chenes suffered the wrath of hurricane Ida. After almost 4 years, you can still see evidence of the devastation the monster category 4 storm left behind. Many of those bayou families lost everything they had multiple years in a row, leaving them empty-handed. 

Many of those families have been living in a portion of their houses, at least as much as they could afford to repair. Government entities pulled out because of the magnitude of the work that needed to be done. Because they intervened over and over and over. Some of those families were asked to leave but this is where they have been for generations. This is home! 

We have the privilege to come alongside Blessed Assurance Missions and Live Oak Baptist Church to help restore this community and make it feel like home again for those families.

We will be helping three of those families this week with a variety of projects, like trimming, plumbing, siding, decking, electrical....to name a few. 

We are excited to be the Lord's hand and feet to this community! 

We had such a great time worshiping with Live Oak Baptist Church! Pastor Jerry blessed us with a wonderful message. Thank you for your Word, Lord! 

A group of us are working on painting the side of Live Oak Baptist Church. We spent Monday scraping off the old paint to prepare it for a fresh coat!

We found out that the siding was laid against the insulation, so we decided to make it right. We pulled the siding off and wrapped it as it should have been done. 

We returned to a house we did siding on last year in order to build the stairs and deck.

This evening, we joined the church for their Wednesday service and then had the treat of a crawfish boil! We enjoyed the yummy seafood and fellowship with members of the community.

We ended our work week by building the stairs to the deck for Mrs Iris. It’s great to see a project finished!

We spent our Friday free day at Zam’s Swamp tour in the morning. We learned a lot about how hurricane Ida affected the area, about alligator hunting, and even got to hold some baby alligators! In the afternoon, we explored the New Orleans French Quarter for some souvenirs.

We headed to the airport early Saturday morning to fly back home. We are so grateful for this trip, for the ways we’ve seen God move, and for the relationships, new and continued. Until next year!