God Doesn't Call the Equipped - He Equips Those Who are Called

Sleeping in the men’s dormitory room at the Olive Tree Volunteer Village, I was awake in the wee hours of the morning. I was trying to drift off to sleep again as I attempted to disregard the rumble of some snoring going on. I had the words and melodies of Fernando Ortega’s song reflecting the imagery of Psalm 63 going through my mind:

The Shadow Of Your Wings

Oh God, you are my God,
Earnestly I seek you.
My soul thirsts for you,
And my flesh yearns for you;
In a dry an weary land,
Where there is no water.

I remember you at night,
In the watches of the night;
In the shadow of your wings,
I sing because you help me.
My soul clings to you,
And your hand upholds me.
You alone, You alone.
You alone.

As my memories of previous mission trips intermingled with my experiences of this week’s mission trip, I remembered the vast devastation we experienced on my first trip to the post-Katrina Gulf Coast region in February 2006. Team members were in a state of shock and awe and the immense scope and severity of the damage all around us. We saw the horrible aftermath that the waters of the hurricane storm surge left behind. The entire contents of people homes were reduced to a messy, moldy, muddy ruin; families’ lives were in turmoil. A dry and waterless land it wasn’t, but the people and the communities they lived in were weary from living in emergency shelters, FEMA trailers or other less- than-ideal conditions.

This week, at the home my crew is working, we were originally scheduled to install sheet rock on the bare, wooden studded walls (the “dry boned” skeletal structure of the house). Due to a backlog at the city of New Orleans’ housing inspection office, our house’s inspection hadn’t been done so we couldn’t proceed with that. The situation as described by Dan March, our construction manager, was that the city’s Inspection Office hadn’t renewed their software license to do their paperwork. So instead, we did exterior painting, installed some new exterior doors, and laid floor tiles in the bathrooms and kitchen areas.

God’s presence has been powerfully present in the work and ministry of the Southern Comfort team members and with both the long and short term Presbyterian Disaster Assistance staff members we’ve worked side-by-side with: God’s love is being poured out upon the peoples of the Gulf Coast. The people we have served have spoken of how God is sustaining them through these difficult times.

Through the Presbytery of Southern Louisiana’s Project Homecoming(PH) public relations and marketing officer who spoke to us one morning before heading out to work, we learned that PH is fully funded to continue it’s operations of case management and construction management through 2011. Fundraising and awareness projects are underway to continue telling the story. One of the ideas promoted was conducting a mardi gras party at our local churches toward that helping them meet their fundraising goal for 2012 and beyond. Learn more a Project Homecoming at http://pslrecovery.org/

We’ve been hearing stories from the Project Homecoming workers about many of the homeowners they’re working with who had previously paid contractors for work repairs to be done, only to be ripped-off with work never done, never completed, or with shoddy materials and/or workmanship that needed to be redone. What a setback for these people and what a blessing that Project Homecoming is able to assist them!

Members of this trip’s Southern Comfort Team are already formulating ideas about the next trip and thinking about who else they might encourage to bring along. How about you? Is God speaking to you, and encouraging you to be a missionary?

When God spoke to Moses out of the burning bush, Moses asked:

“"Who am I, that I should go ?” "O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue. "

“The LORD said to him, "Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say. "

When I have an opportunity to speak with someone about going on a mission trip, sometimes that individual expresses some hesitation and uncertainty about their individual set of skills. I try to assure them, that if God is seeking, calling and encouraging them to serve others, God has a plan for that individual; God has a specific task in mind for him or her. I ensure them that “God doesn’t just call the equipped, but that He will equip those who are called.”

Paul Dungey, Westminster Presbyterian Church, Auburn, NY