“Hurricane Laura made landfall Aug. 27 pummeling coastal areas with heavy rains and destructive winds. Hurricane Laura underwent one of the fastest and strongest intensifications in Gulf history—quickly ratcheting up to wind speeds of 150 mph—before hitting Louisiana. Again on October 9, Hurricane Delta crashed ashore in southwestern Louisiana as a Category 2 storm with sustained winds close to 100 mph, causing damage to already devastated areas.” (https://www.samaritanspurse.org/).
In October, my squad spent 2 weeks serving in Louisiana with Samaritan’s Purse: an international, non denominational, evangelical Christian disaster relief organization. We spent our days ripping out moldy walls, ceilings, and floors, tarping roofs, and clearing brush, all while getting to know & love on homeowners. Samaritan’s Purse is working in several locations in Louisiana, and my team had the privilege of spending time in both Lake Charles and DeRidder. We stayed at churches SP had been operating out of since the first hurricane hit, and got to work with people who had been volunteering with SP for years. Besides our group of young adults, most other volunteers were a lot older. And, due to COVID, volunteers have been more scarce. The Lord allowed us to bless Samaritan’s Purse with more volunteers, making it possible for us serve & reach more people in the surrounding communities.
At times, serving was incredibly hard and draining, but SO fruitful and worth it. Lots of tearing down and clearing out to rebuild physically & spiritually. We saw the Lord present in the midst of pain and destruction, just as much as He’s in the joy and restoration. I could probably go on forever, so here’s a bunch of pictures to recap our time in Louisiana with Samaritan’s Purse!
pit stop on our way to LA! somewhere in alabama.
dinner!
4/6 of our teams in lake charles, where we spent our first week.
my team after we finished out first day working with SP. hot, smelly, and tired, but still smiling!
the roof crew! emma, chloe, layna, and daniel (another SP volunteer) tarped roofs almost the whole week in lake charles in the direct sunlight. hot & hard work, but they killed it!
lunch break!
our team in lake charles! in the chair is our leader, palmer. we love him!
ripping out the walls, ceiling, and flooring.
another angle in the same house. when we started that morning, most rooms were full of belongings. by the end of the day, the rooms were clean down to the studs.
a few leaders & squad mates praying over betty, a homeowner. she mentioned that her retinas were torn, causing her to see squiggly lines. this had prevented her from sewing & reading scriptures. after praying over her eyes, the lines were gone! such a special moment.
ripping out the walls, ceiling, and flooring.
tyvek suits! we wore these in houses that had bad mold damage. they were suuuuuper hot & made us sweat buckets, but they kept us safe!
mold 🙂
sometimes while working, someone comes up to you & wants to take your picture. so here’s a really kinda awkward picture of libby & i posing in the middle of trying to hang a tarp before taking down a portion of the ceiling.
taking down the ceiling!
our team with bud, a homeowner. we spent 2 days working at his house and getting to know him & his family.
once we finished at a worksite, we presented the homeowner with a bible, signed by every person on the team. here’s my teammate madison, giving bud the bible.
another sweet homeowner we got to know & serve!
the aftermath of a tree that fell on a homeowner’s shed. it looks bad, but upon talking to the homeowners, they told us the angle the tree fell was really an answer to prayer. to the left in the picture is their house, and to the right, just outside of the picture is their big garage. they prayed that if the tree fell, it would fall on the shed, which was the least valuable of the three structures – and that’s right where it fell!
after we removed most of the tree that fell & the shed.
at our last house, the homeowners blessed us with a big platter of food for lunch. here’s kaylin & i enjoying it 🙂
sunrise at the church we stayed at in DeRidder.
team align. it was really sweet to work & serve alongside them. i just love them!
we went to a laundromat! after about 2 months of handwashing all our clothes it was a real treat 🙂
halloween! welcome to the zoo! team align became lions and the zeal bros became zebras 🙂 we were supposed to travel home to GA the day of halloween, but instead, we drove to lafayette, LA, where we spent the night & had a halloween party at our coaches house. such a fun night!
a pretty sunset at a gas station somewhere in alabama on our way home 🙂
