Waiting for Gustav in SW Louisiana

Here is SW Louisiana we are watching, waiting….and talking. For thirty of my thirty eight years I lived in the hurricane zone of the Florida and Louisiana coasts. In this part of the country we have four seasons just like everyone else, except we drop winter and add hurricane season. (Instead of making snowmen, we become experts in weathermen.)

There is a very unique energy that accompanies the approach of a storm. Everywhere you walk you hear the conversations and the storm related laughter. Then, prompted by some invisible signal the community takes the crisis seriously. You have never been to Wal-Mart till you have been to Wal-Mart during the run up to a storm!

At this time, the plot for the storm seems to be heading right for us or just a tick to our west. We are about 50 miles inland, but it looks like it could be an interesting week. Three years ago our church suddenly became an emergency shelter following Katrina. We housed several hundred people in our fellowship hall for weeks. It was beyond what appeared to be the limits of our facility and our people. But it was not beyond the limits of what God could do through a willing people. When I came as pastor a little over a year ago, the experience remained a defining moment for many people in our church.

At this time other resources are supposed to be available in our community and we do not plan to have the same role. But we watch and wait. Ready for whatever God would have for us to do.