Rescue in Haiti 
 

A team from Rescue Net has gone to Haiti to help out with the earthquake relief. Unfortunately, Gary was unable to go on this particular trip. However, we’re still very concerned and interested in what our teams will be doing. YWAM has a Base in Haiti. One member of the YWAM team died during the earthquake. The YWAM Base has been able to open up as a rescue shelter to help people in the area.

The RN team had some trouble and then some breakthroughs in getting flights to Haiti. Flights were very expensive to Miami and then to Haiti. Of course no flights were going into Haiti any more. Qantas gave them extra luggage free of charge for the equipment they’re bringing which was great. They were in Miami for 2 days but finally made arrangements to get on private jet with other medical teams.

The team will be there for about 2 weeks, working wherever is needed- and as I’m sure you’ve seen from the footage, the need is great. They’ll be able to get in and work with medical teams, search and rescue, as well as food and water distribution. There may be some on the team who can work with people doing trauma counselling. Or it’s possible they may work with other agencies in coordinating the logistics to figure out how to meet the overwhelming needs.

The news I’ve heard so far includes:

-       They were working at a medical clinic trying to get to as many patients as possible, but had not enough supplies for everyone

-       They were involved in rescuing a man who survived 10 days under rubble

One news report is here: http://mercyworks.org/haiti/rescued/ 

Please pray for them while they’re away. Pray for safety, finances for their trip, sufficient supplies to do what they need to do, wisdom to make the right decisions.

If you’d like to give financially to the RN’s trip to Haiti please let us know. If you’d like to give financially to get Gary on more of these trips you can go here for donation options.

Indonesia 
 

In September 2009 a 7.9 earthquake hit Western Sumatra, Indonesia. There were 1117 people killed; 200,000 houses uninhabitable; many of the large buildings in the city were damaged or crumbled including 968 schools damaged and 26 health centres. The building codes of this nation are not up to what they should be, so many of the buildings were destroyed that maybe wouldn’t have been if in another nation.

The rescue and relief ministry that Gary works with left for Padang, Indonesia only 3 days after the disaster happened. Their team consisted of 3 members from Australia, 5 members from Europe and later joined by 2 people from Indonesia.

They signed in with the United Nations to assist in the area of Disaster Assessment. They were given a few 4x4s and sent up into the hills and rural areas where no one else had been to yet to do an evaluation of the regional areas. This involved going into the villages to find out how they were coping and what needs they had: did they have water? How many houses were gone? Was anyone in desperate need of food? Some in the team were involved in trauma counselling as well. They also did some work in the area of medical help.

Indonesia is the largest Muslim nation in the world. There are so many needs in this nation: physical and spiritual. Our role is to go in as a “good Samaritan” - giving care to those who need it, asking nothing in return. However, a couple of Christian Indonesians joined the team as guides and translators. One man Gary said was “quite the evangelist” and shared whenever he could-  even to the Muslim drivers assigned to them. I’m sure during those many days spent with the team, those drivers were able to see and hear of the love of God on many occasions!

Kids always suffer the most in these type of traumatic situations, often not completely understanding what has happened. In one area, the team came across a principal of the local school. He told them that the kids were too scared to come back to school. The fear of the unknown gripped them. The team put on a bit of a program with games and balloon animals. This was just an attempted to get the kids out and together again, trying to get past the fear. The team left with a sense of accomplishment that even for just a few minutes the kids were able to be kids. And hopefully enough to get back into school.