Katrina vs God's Children (part 2)

One of Discipleship Miniseries' goals for the October trip was to some how come in contact with 100 families and be able to provide Christmas presents to those families. In cooperation with St Matthews UMC, we were able to reach and surpass that goal 9 fold. The day after Christmas a team of 11 left the mountain and by the Grace of God headed south with over 900 gift boxes, 125 flood buckets and nearly 50 dozen cookies. During our whirlwind visit we hosted 2 Christmas parties. During our first party at St Matthews the team was able to meet people pass out gifts and spend time listening to their stories. In one case a member of the team introduced one family to another who wanted to help a family financially. Again, what an honor to be part of God's plan. Our second day was spent in what can only be described as heavenly chaos. Taking our show on the road to Chalmette in St. Bernard's Parish we conducted our party in a government built social hall surround by 700+ FEMA tailors. We where able to show the people of St Bernard Parish that God cares enough to send us to be with them and to share the Love and Hope of Jesus Christ. We did this by sharing the Christmas story using a play and passing out the gifts that many of you provided for the children of Chalmette. As we spoke to residents in the social hall one of the parish councilwomen came up to Rev Terry Collins and thanked us for providing the gifts for the kid. She also said all the work that we and the other relief teams have done has been overwhelming but what has been the greatest joy is just our being in Chalmette and taking time out of our busy lives, showing the people in the community feel like someone cared, bring back the real reason of Christmas. As we reflected on the events of our day in Chalmette one of our teammates said it reminded him of what he thought the First Christmas in the stable would have been like noisy, chaotic, crowded --- Heavenly Chaos.