Once again God gave me the opportunity to serve Him by serving others on the Tates Creek Association's Disaster Relief/Rebuild team. Once again we went to Pascagoula, Mississippi and for the first time since Katrina in 2005 I did NOT see any blue tarps covering roofs! Still lots of signs of Katrina's destruction, and probably some places will never get re-built but God has moved in a mighty way there and I'm sure that part of my heart will stay there on the gulf coast forever!
There were friends from 5 churches on the trip and we had a wonderful time! Staying together in the Jackson County Association's bunkhouse always makes me think that the first church must have been alot like that. We went to church together, worked together, ate together, laughed and cried together and sang praises to our LORD together!! It was a blessed week.
This is where we went to church on Sunday morning. It was also one of the churches we worked on while we were down there.
Pat and I were sitting on a picnic table in the soon-to-be-floored covered deck that they will use for an outdoor fellowship hall and kitchen.
We had a wonderful worship service there and enjoyed meeting the members.
We packed a few pews even though our whole team wasn't there yet.
This is the pastor and his wife and a couple of their elders.
Oh, I almost forgot to post a picture of our partial team that Brother Butch took before church...
He even zoomed in to get a really good picture of one of our dear Brothers in Christ up to some meanness!!
But we love him anyway. If the guys didn't pick on us we would think something was wrong with them!!
Monday: Getting ready for breakfast and then to head out to our job sites. We had 4 wonderful cooks!!! They make sure we don't get hungry.
This team had 3 Keiths on it! This is Keith Parke who we called simply K.P. He always wants to be first in the chow line.
This is Lilly Orchard Baptist Church in Moss Point, Mississippi. This is where the team I was on worked the first 3 days.
This is the old church which is now their fellowship hall. Just before Katrina hit in 2005, they had build a new church and had it finished except for Sunday School rooms. Katrina tore off the roof of the new sanctuary and tore down the sunday school rooms. The only part that was undamaged was the old church.
They repaired the roof and replaced the furniture in the new sanctuary, and were working on this addition to the new church that would house their Sunday School rooms. The old church made a perfect fellowship hall.
This is my team....Frankie and Billy Wayne...
Larry the 'Lectrician
Butch the apprentice.
And the queens of caulk! Sheila, Judy and Pat.
Tune back in next week for the second installment of "What happens in Pascagoula...stays in Pascagoula" and "Stumpy the al
-log-ator"
UPDATE:
Did I mention how much we ate?
Catfish and Bluegrass music at Catfish Point!
Barnhills!!! I love this restaurant. Everytime we go we eat here after church on Sunday morning.
Even after a huge breakfast most days the guys from Lilly Orchard would fix us "brunch"! Woody is on the left and Archie on the right. They were so good to us!
And I did promise to show you "Stumpy" the Al
logator so here he is....kinda hard to see him.
To be perfectly honest I can't even see him now! But we crossed this creek to and from Lilly Orchard each day and there was a LOG in the creek that looked just like an Alligator!! So we named him "Stumpy". He was always looking for us to come by...always in the same spot! That was one lazy al
logator!!
Even after a big breakfast and a nice brunch we worked so hard we had to have a tootsie roll pop break! Yum! We took sooo many pictures that I will have to post more later!
After lunch on Sunday, we took a break from eating and showed Marie and Betty the Pascagoula Beach Park and walked down the pier. Beautiful day!
Because we love Jesus so much!! We love to serve others in HIS Name!
Wonderful job trimming the windows at Lilly Orchard!
Part of God's plan for our team sometimes is to just listen and talk to lonely little ladies and spoil their poodles! I am really good at that! I was so blessed to be able to sit and talk to Ms. Kathleen. She spoke many words of wisdom to me that day and I will never forget her and Sissy!!
This is the little cross that Larry made for her out of electrical copper.
As soon as I gave it to her she wanted me to hang it up! Her son had passed away last year and we were able to bond in that way. God sure does know what He is doing!
We had our very own pool! No, I was not sitting on Frankie! The pool had a slide and I was sitting on that. Looks like Marie had fun huh?!
We went to church on Wednesday night at Lilly Orchard Baptist. Don't know for sure if Billy Wayne and Frankie are hugging or wrestling!
Opps! I forgot....What happens in Pascagoula, stays in Pascagoula!
