Hurricane Katrina
Wow. There is no other word to describe the awesome power that this hurricane unleashed on the Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama Gulf coast. Watching the trees in my new yard bend and sway in the wind that was a good 150 miles from the eye of the storm renewed my respect for our awesome and sovereign God. For those questions that must be asked during this time, I refer you to 3 articles written by Dr. John Piper, the Pastor for Preaching at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
1. Tsunami, Sovereignty, and Mercy.
2. Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be?.
3. Why I Do Not Say, "God Did Not Cause the Calamity, but He Can Use It for Good".
None of these articles were written specifically about Hurricane Katrina. The first was written about the Tsunami in the Indian Ocean on December 26, 2004 that took the lives of about 200,000 people. The second is a good defence of God's total control of all events, both moral and amoral. The third is a response to the oft repeated phrase after after the 9-11 attacks. Obviously the hurricane and the terrorist attacks are different because the terrorist attacks were executed by men, and the hurricane was not, but the point of the article is still very timely.
On a personal note, Steph and I are doing fine. We lost power at our house at 07:14 on Monday and didn't get it back till 10:09 yesterday, but that was the extent of our "damage" from the storm. I was able to move all of our food in our freezer to our deep freezer and to take it to a friend of a friend's house who had power, so we didn't lose as much as we might have. On the other hand, things seem to be getting a little uneasy here in Baton Rouge. I don't know how much the city has swollen in the past couple of days, but I suppose it's at least doubled in population from all of the evacuees. There have been reports of increased incidents of robberies and violence in the town. Even the Wal-Mart Supercenter on Siegen (usually a 24 hour store) just a few miles from our house closed at 22:00 (that's 10pm) tonight. Also, it seems that you can't buy gas anywhere in the city. Every gas station I passed today was shut down. Steph has been going back to work, and I've been helping out the folks at The Oaks Community Church. They are running a shelter there, and I have helped serve food, clean some bathrooms, and mostly work on the computer, looking up phone numbers, doing data entry etc. By the grace of God, I have been able to help 2 families get in touch with their loved ones. There are two forms at nola.com that people are using to try and connect with family and friends, Missing Persons Forum, and the I'm OK Forum. One lady was very upset that her daughter might not have made it out of New Orleans alive. We posted on the site but heard no response, and later found that her ex-husband was posting on the site as well, looking for the same daughter. Please pray that Paco and Diane and Janie and Keith Munster find their daughter (and sister), Roxanne.
I've had a long day, but maybe I'll have some updates later.
1. Tsunami, Sovereignty, and Mercy.
2. Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be?.
3. Why I Do Not Say, "God Did Not Cause the Calamity, but He Can Use It for Good".
None of these articles were written specifically about Hurricane Katrina. The first was written about the Tsunami in the Indian Ocean on December 26, 2004 that took the lives of about 200,000 people. The second is a good defence of God's total control of all events, both moral and amoral. The third is a response to the oft repeated phrase after after the 9-11 attacks. Obviously the hurricane and the terrorist attacks are different because the terrorist attacks were executed by men, and the hurricane was not, but the point of the article is still very timely.
On a personal note, Steph and I are doing fine. We lost power at our house at 07:14 on Monday and didn't get it back till 10:09 yesterday, but that was the extent of our "damage" from the storm. I was able to move all of our food in our freezer to our deep freezer and to take it to a friend of a friend's house who had power, so we didn't lose as much as we might have. On the other hand, things seem to be getting a little uneasy here in Baton Rouge. I don't know how much the city has swollen in the past couple of days, but I suppose it's at least doubled in population from all of the evacuees. There have been reports of increased incidents of robberies and violence in the town. Even the Wal-Mart Supercenter on Siegen (usually a 24 hour store) just a few miles from our house closed at 22:00 (that's 10pm) tonight. Also, it seems that you can't buy gas anywhere in the city. Every gas station I passed today was shut down. Steph has been going back to work, and I've been helping out the folks at The Oaks Community Church. They are running a shelter there, and I have helped serve food, clean some bathrooms, and mostly work on the computer, looking up phone numbers, doing data entry etc. By the grace of God, I have been able to help 2 families get in touch with their loved ones. There are two forms at nola.com that people are using to try and connect with family and friends, Missing Persons Forum, and the I'm OK Forum. One lady was very upset that her daughter might not have made it out of New Orleans alive. We posted on the site but heard no response, and later found that her ex-husband was posting on the site as well, looking for the same daughter. Please pray that Paco and Diane and Janie and Keith Munster find their daughter (and sister), Roxanne.
I've had a long day, but maybe I'll have some updates later.
posted by jigawatt at 10:23:00 PM
2 Comments:
James,
How is the crime in your area? What about traffic in Baton Rouge and around the LSU campus?
There were reports of increased incidents of violence and robberies soon after the hurricane. Some stores in BR started closing early; people were uneasy. But I myself never saw anything like that. I think if there was any "unrest" it's settled down by now.
Traffic is horrible. Avoid Airline Highway at all costs, northbound and southbound. It took me over an hour to get from Siegen & Perkins to Bluebonnet & Airline. This should have taken 10 minutes or less.
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