Treme Painting

Today was the second day of our missions trip,and we painted a really old, neglected elementary school in the Historic Treme neighborhood where Louis Armstrong was born.  With only nine people in our group,  we finished painting the entire first floor and helped the school begin the process of moving out. As a charter school, they had been given five years probation in order to get their grades up to appropriate marks. Sadly, many of the students come from the notorious Ninth Ward and were unable to reach the mark.  As a result they are not having their contracts renewed and a new school will take its place. God placed us in this place to give the next school a fresh start! Please pray that God would send the right people to care for the youth of the lower Ninth Ward. 

Not quite so easy

<p>After a day of poor weather on Sunday, we hit the ground running on Monday with a wakeup call at 5:45am and breakfast @ 6am. From there, group 2 got to take a nap while we shuttled group 1 to their three separate worksites.&nbsp; Between refurbishing building materials at Old City restoration, painting the exterior of homes in the historic Treme district where Louis Armstrong was born, and finishing a home on Dupree Street there was plenty of work to go around. Group 2 had a team meeting at St Paul's homecoming center to discuss work plans. We learned that we would be scraping &amp; painting a shelter on the shores of Lake Pontchartrain.&nbsp; We all worked very hard the first day and also prayed hard with each person taking 30 minutes to rest, pray, and read Gods word in the "prayer chair." Our specific crew worked on the shelter, which was sitting at the foot of the dikes surrounding Lake Pontchartrain.&nbsp; This building had most likely been built by the army corps of engineers during construction of the dikes and then turned over to private groups. St Pauls is planning to use it as a shelter for homeless individuals to stay in. The structure had white paint on the surface, but as we scraped we uncovered layer upon layer of colorful paints. As one student remarked, "I would love to have seen the building with the bright shade of red on it!" Peeling &amp;scraping paint for hours will make you nostalgic for sure... A local water management truck helped us clean the mud out of the bathrooms with their pump truck and thanked our crew for helping.  The people of New Orleans are extremely proud and resilient and continue to fight for their way of life. We ended our day with some time with Dwayne, the Director of Annunciation Mission, who spoke with us about the importance of volunteers in the rebuilding of Nola.  Please continue to pray for the gospel to take hold in the streets of New Orleans, that the people would see Christians leading the charge for this fair city.

Rolling with the punches

Mission trips are about serving others. This is easy to do when you are at the job site and see the work that is being done. However when the little things don't work out like not having enough beds or the rain delays plans for a few hours you have to learn to put your desires and yourself last. This year part of the building we are staying in is under construction which means that we don't have a place to hang out or play games. This means we have 104 people wandering the small dorm hall while we try to find something to entertain us! God is using this to teach us how to be patient respectful and flexible while we deal with rainy weather and crazy people! 

Flexibility

Exhausted and malnourished from the many fast food meals and 12 hour bus ride to the city of new Orleans,  our group of roughly sixty students and chaperones dragged out of our rooms to shower and eat before the 10 am church service. The girl bathrooms have four showers and 2 bathrooms , so it got a little bit crowded while making our tired selves look acceptable to go out in public! The leaders bought the group bought the group delicious doughnuts ( key lime, blueberry glazed, chocolate covered with sprinkles) from a hole in the wall sort of place that a local recommended. After breakfast we went to Redeemer Presbytarian church. Our group took up almost the entire left side of the quaint church. The worship team had a sort of classic sound with the beautiful hymns and the help of a violin. The tiny church bellowed while praising God. The preacher spoke of money. He reminded the congregation of the difficulty of a rich man getting into heaven. The more money a person has, the more independent a person feels. He reminded us that one must accept the kingdom of God like a child, with dependence on Him; money can hinder this. It was a great reminder for those of us on the mission trip, reminding us giving of our wealth or time to help others.