Now...here's some folks in need of evangelism!

Check it out.

Matt's recent AgapePress column

Caring for Jesus, caring for the poor...

Your name is "Mo!"

My recent AgapePress column. Thanks for reading.

Jesus still stands!

The New Orleans Times-Picayune blog reports that some are claiming "divine intervention" in the fact that amid total devastation around St. Louis Cathedral, a statue of Jesus remains standing after the storm. The only things missing from the statue are the left thumb and index finger, which area residents are working together to save. Hat tip: BeliefNet

Rick Warren on Katrina

Rick Warren's e-mail letter to his Pastors.com list...great stuff:

The Church is the only network large enough to handle a disaster like this. Media attention has been focused on the thousands of people who have taken refuge in the Astrodome. But more than 150,000 other people are being cared for by churches. There is amazing organization at the local church level...

It’s time for the church to shine. Disaster presents Christians with unprecedented opportunities to mobilize the Church and become the hands and feet of Christ. We need to become audio-visual Christians – not just talking about it, but doing it.

I believe that in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina God has given us an opportunity for what could be the Church’s finest hour. God specializes in bringing good out of bad. He loves to take the broken things in our lives and turn them into something really meaningful. He loves to take our greatest hurt and turn it into our greatest opportunity for ministry. The wonderful truth of the Gospel is that, even in the bad things of the world, God is able to make something good.

Hurricane Katrina was the greatest natural disaster in the history of America. More people have died because of this than died from any natural disaster in American history. Hundreds of thousands of people have lost literally everything they own. More than 1 million people are without a home. And the storm caused more than $100 billion in damage.

How does God bring good out of that?

In every crisis, there is an opportunity for God to show his love. He shows his love by working through his people. A few days ago, when I was at the Astrodome where 20,000 people were lying on cots because they don’t have anywhere else to go, I saw hundreds of volunteers. I saw God everywhere – working in the hands and hearts of people.

Do you see what God is doing? Do you realize the opportunity God has given us?

God is using the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina to give the Church an opportunity to be the Church. He is bringing displaced people into our communities – people who are homeless and need help and love and care and concern. Their lives have been shaken and they are asking the most important questions of life: Who is my family? What is the meaning and purpose of life? What is church? People are more open to Christ when they are in a tough time than at any other point in their lives. Read the whole column here

Listener comment on radio program

On the radio program I do (talk show) I asked for callers to ring us up and tell us their stories of encouragement and challenge. A lady was headed out of state from Waveland (probably the hardest hit of the communities on the Mississippi coast).

She said that after she saw what Katrina had done to her house (gone, totally) and her cars (smashed, completely) and her life (changed, absolutely) she said she tried to find a place to rest and could only locate a cardboard box. She flattened it out and laid on it, looked up at the stars in the sky and thanked Jesus.

I thanked Him for our life in Waveland, for the chance we had to live in our home, for the friends and family we had. I thanked Him for all that He had given us and the time we had to enjoy it. I just...thanked Him.

She, like so many others we have heard from on the coast, has that kind of "can-do" "Thank the Lord" "We are down but not out" attitude.

This woman's life is changed forever. She is looking forward to forever. Faithfulness

Matt's recent AgapePress column

Here it is...

Haley on Jeb

"And I've told Jeb Bush, Florida has been so critical to what we're doing on the Coast, that he's term-limited and when he's upafter 06, we want him to come to Mississippi and run for king of the Coast because he'll get elected." (Haley Barbour/Sept. 7, 2005)

Thanks, Jeb!

This rocked my boat today - "Blessed are those that mourn..."

From PreachingToday.com

In 1994, Leroy Sievers, producer of the ABC news program Nightline, was sent to document the end of the genocidal campaign in Rwanda, Africa. Looking back on the experience, Sievers said: "There is evil in the world; I had seen it up close. But nothing comes close to Rwanda."

The conflict had involved the country's two primary ethnic groups, as Hutu rebels systematically slaughtered the Tutsi tribe. "This wasn't a war fought with smart bombs," said Sievers. "This was machetes and clubs and knives. Almost a million people killed by hand." The genocide was widely reported and discussed, and a U.N. peacekeeping force was sent to the country. However, the commander of that force, Romeo Dallaire, did not have enough troops to stop the Hutus, and was later told not to take sides. Sievers says that Dallaire "was found six years later on a park bench in Canada, blind drunk, screaming for someone to kill him."

Sievers himself remains extremely affected by what he saw in Rwanda, especially in a refugee camp located on the Zaire-Rwanda border. Known as Camp Cholera, it was essentially a barren wasteland where 50 to 100 thousand Rwandan refugees had come to die. One event in particular, which took place as he stood in the middle of the camp, has burned itself into Sievers' mind:

I felt something on my foot. I looked down and saw a small boy. He looked to be about five, which meant he was probably ten. Malnutrition will do that. He was lying on his back and had thrown his arm up over his head. His fingers had gotten tangled in my boot laces. As I looked in his eyes, I saw the light go out. And he died. … And all I could do was shake my foot to free my laces from his fingers, and then move on to catch up to my team. …

Every night, when I lie down in bed in my nice suburban house and I close my eyes to sleep, that little boy comes to me and tugs on my boot laces. And every night he asks me why we let this happen, and I have no answer. And every night I pray that it will be the last time that he comes for me.

But I know better.

• Citation: Leroy Sievers, "The Ghosts of Rwanda," The Week, (8-12-05); submitted by Kevin Miller, Carol Stream, Illinois.

John Wesley on Katrina?

Wesley, bless his prophetic heart, had a sermon considered to be one of his most lively on the "why" and "how we can escape" of earthquakes. Here. Could the same be said of, say, hurricanes? And if not all the time, sometimes?

Perhaps too many are too quick to say so - and it certainly sounds abrasive when they suggest it - but could this be God trying to cleanse the decadence and corruption of New Orleans and the casinos of Mississippi? Perhaps not...but I wouldn't be too quick to say "No way!" either.

And now, a word from Democratic Underground

Incredible, really, in these days of Katrina related heroism:

I was on my home and was on the ramp getting off the highway. I saw a mini-van on the side of the road. There was a lady standing next to the van and in her arms she held her child. I can only assume her mini-van had broken down. I don't know, perhaps with so many gad stations being out of gas, she had also run out. I slowed down and started to pull over to offer her a ride. At the very last second I noticed a "W" sticker on the back of her vehicle and I sped up and drove off....

On the other hand, so many hateful thoughts went through my head. I wondered how a person could see what was going on in NO and still have one of those awful stickers on their car. How could they support an awful excuse for a human being that has let our country down and is letting Americans die after they have made it through the storm? How can someone be so blind and so stupid?

Many commentators, read them, seem to be consoling...even in agreement.

Update: And this from "The Underground" via the OpinionJournal:

Over at DemocraticUnderground.com, "Spazito" weighs in with a theory about Chief Justice Rehnquist's death:

Bet he died days ago and they are just announcing it now to try and take the heat off bush [sic]. One man has died, well guess what, thousands have died and more are still dying.

It was inevitable that someone would suggest this eventually. But Spazito did it at 11:10 p.m. EDT last night--four minutes after the announcement that Rehnquist had died!

"Hey, boy, you not from around here, are ya?"

One of the reasons we think Mississippi's Haley Barbour is one of the best governors in the nation...this exchange:

Question: “Some people have said that both the supplies and manpower that are in Iraq could be used here in the homeland to help aid Mississippi—what do you say to that?”

Answer: “Where are you from?”

Response: “I’m from the National Public Radio.”

Answer: “I figured that. You know what? A reporter asked President Bush today, and said ‘there’s a lot of talk down here about Iraq, with resources going to Iraq.’ Whereas, there’s no talk about it with anyone I talk to—except reporters. I haven’t heard the word Iraq mentioned one time—in Hattiesburg, Meridian, Laurel, Gulfport, Biloxi—not one time. But when I’m asked, I’ll give you what the President, who was nicer about the question than I am, and who’s nicer than I would have been to that guy. There’s probably a lot of talk about it at the hotel where the press is staying. But, we can do more than one thing at once. We are a large country with tremendous capacity and amazing willingness to use that capacity when it needs to be used. I have not heard or seen anybody other than a reporter that has used the word ‘Iraq’ in the same sentence with the word ‘hurricane.’”

Haley is showing his mettle during this hurricane crisis. Good - we need a strong leader ... now more than ever!

Throttled in Mississippi

Update: Best article to date I've read on the human interest side of this thing...

My.

First chance to get to post due to lack of power.

That was one mean hurricane! And, of course, being significantly north of the coast in Mississippi we only lost power and had a good bit of damage because of downed trees, and other damage to buildings, etc. We are three hours north. The cost to our city (Jackson) will be in the millions. Some say it will be $25 billion total for the state. Power is out in my neighborhood. My family (eight of us) remain huddled in my office trying to escape the sweltering heat of the Deep South.

Lots of people have been evacuated here, of course. And the looting has started here too, according to the news accounts. But not covered much in the news are the people giving up rooms in their houses to evacuees, churches going the second and third mile, donations of money, food and general compassion. The latter is the real story.

My wife is a native Pascagoulan. Her town is devastated. Huge portions just wiped out. And so it is across the coast of Mississippi. New Orleans is to be evacuated, perhaps for months. And Katrina was no respecter of persons. Congressman Gene Taylor's house is gone. So, too, Senator Trent Lott's. The poor and elderly, of course, are the hardest hit. What do they do next?

The president is to be here tomorrow. What an eyeful he will see. Mr. Bush thought he saw devastation duirng 9/11. This will be 9/11 on sterioids...for mile, after mile, after mile. No wonder the radical Muslims are adopting Katrina as their sister in jihad.

Imagine living on the coast of Mississippi or in New Orleans. No job to go to. Food tough to come by. If you are in town, nothing to do but weep. If you are out of town, nothing to do but weep without knowing first hand what you are weeping about. You have a family. You have no idea what to do this week, or several weeks from now when your job and living prospects will probably be no better.

Devastation.

And the body count? Unknown - but thousands likely. Thousands.

Pray and give if you can. Mostly, pray.