Youth team from Portland, Oregon, gutted five Louisiana homes in four days. Photo: Victoria Schaaf
The story of New Orleans, the one that must be told, has been brewing in me for over two and a half years. I have told it to many friends, many family members and even some strangers. But each time I tell it, I do not feel like I have said enough. The kind of human suffering I have experienced on multiple occasions is not something I can just say once in passing conversation. Rather, I feel that this country, and the greatest world, needs to know of the losses suffered in the Gulf Region, and they need to know of the hope that is real and being lived out in this great historical city.
My freshmen year in college I was working as the Intern to the Director of Christian Ministries at First Presbyterian Church in Portland, Oregon. My first day of college was the day the lives of the residents of New Orleans were changed forever. Our youth team responded by planning a mission trip to the Fish Camp Volunteer Village in Luling, Louisiana. Together with six other leaders and 17 youth, we gutted five homes in four days.
My initial response to the reality that so much of New Orleans had been destroyed was limited. I did not know how to take it all in. It was so overwhelming. The stories I heard are burned in my mind; stories of escape, returning to destruction and hope to rebuild.
I wondered how these people could be so hopeful. I was awestruck by the thankful tears they cried as a team of teenagers from Oregon helped them start over. All I wanted was to give them their lives back, as much as I could, and I have set out to do just that.
My sophomore in college the story was similar. After being grandfathered in on account of good behavior the first year, our youth returned to Luling. We spent the week at Gentilly Presbyterian Church, setting up a site that would be used for Project Homecoming in the coming months. The church reader board read the words, “Live like you are dying.” That statement alone said so much about remembering to live like hope is on its way.
What was different about this year was my investment in the individuals. Too many stories of chaos transitioned to stories of faces, lives, families, futures and suffering. I bonded with Deb and Vaune, who had both lost everything and relocated. I learned their stories and I saw the pain and everyday hardships they go through. When Deb asked me at the end of the week, “Will you be back?” I knew that when I said, “Absolutely, I will be back, I promise.” I meant it. For the sake of humanity, for the sake of my fellow Americans, I have a social responsibility to do something. These were my brothers and sisters, each and every one of them.
While in New Orleans the second year, we were able to stop in and visit the families we had helped the first year. One of the families we had helped was not an original assignment. It was a woman who came up to me at our van and asked who we were and what we were doing. After explaining who we were, she shared a story of how her family had lost seven thousand dollars to a faulty contractor. We inspected her home and found many health and safety hazards. PDA allowed us to work on her home that week and we were able to leave here with a gutted home and a renewed sense of hope.
When we went to visit the second year, no one answered the door. But the curtains were drawn, and as I peered in through new windows I was floored by what I saw. Tears ran down my face as I saw a home rebuilt. There was furniture, a ceiling fan, a new kitchen, bookshelves and family photos. We had given someone their life back. I was determined to reproduce this.
In the fall of my junior year I resigned my position at the church to take an on-campus job. This left me with one goal in mind: To make the students of Warner Pacific College aware of the people in the Gulf Region still in need and cause them to act. I spoke in chapels, hosted benefit concerts, talked to everyone I knew and received faculty support.
Myself and another student were given permission to launch a school sponsored pilot trip to New Orleans in the Spring of 2008. This pilot trip will lead to further student led mission trips to the Gulf Region each year.
As a result of this year’s efforts, three students, a faculty member and two contractors will be going to the Olive Tree PDA location in New Orleans. We are told we will be rebuilding, but I know there is more in store than just that.
I know this is not my last trip to New Orleans. My hope is to return in the Spring of 2009 and, after graduation, to volunteer full time for as long as I can. I dream of the day I see this city restored. I have seen the chaos of New Orleans, but what keeps me telling my story, what keeps my heart stirring for these people; is the hope that comforts the chaotic and brings new life to New Orleans.
“For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans for welfare and not for calamity. To give you a future and a hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11)
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