“Many hands make light work.”
Hurricane Helene has wrecked havoc on the Southern Apps. Now the task is to rebuild and to offer assistance to those who need it. There is work to be done, and a lot of it. Once rescue work is done and people have access to consistent basic needs, this is a marathon and not a sprint for work teams. Steady wins the race. Infrastructure and homes will need to be repaired and rebuilt. There will be a great rush of volunteers early on. However, the real work of rebuilding will be ongoing for months if not years. I have worked with some great folks on the mission field who specialize in disaster relief. Here are a few tips which I learned from them through the years:
***Important Addendum***: Don’t be afraid to work in places which aren’t on the news. There are places with no news coverage which need help desperately.
- Many of these folks have lost everything. While working on a house might be a project for you for one day, for the people in that house you are their lifeline to their lives getting back to normal. You might be the only person who knows about their needs.
- Don’t get sucked into odd jobs, though. Be able to triage what needs to be done. Are their basic needs(food, water, shelter, clothing) met? Do they have the medication they need? Do they have communication in case of an emergency? Did the job get done satisfactorily?
- Make sure someone follows up with the families who you work with. It is easy to walk away from a work site and never return. Be a person of your word.
- Do quality work, and by that I mean professional quality. Ya’ll, I have seen some great mission work, and I have had to tear out things. Make sure that the work that you do would be acceptable in your own house. Also remember, you aren’t building the Taj. It doesn’t have to be perfect.
- Most likely the Lord is opening a door between you and the families who you work with. Don’t assume that the greatest gift will be what you offer. I have often found that who we work with…they offer the greatest gifts even in their darkest hour.
- Use your gifts, and don’t be afraid to try something new. If you are in the medical field, use it. If you are in the construction field, us it. But understand this, there are lots of really good workers out there, and they just need to be trained.
- Don’t be a cowboy and please ditch the messiah complex at the door. Whew. This is big. Get on teams who know what they are doing and stay away from teams who do not. It is better to move slowly, than to move quickly and produce low quality craftsmanship OR someone gets hurt. Work steady, work smart, and understand you are part of a much bigger piece of the puzzle.
- Speaking of Safety. I used to always tell my classes at school that if they wanted to have a great field trip, they had to do two prerequisite things. They had to BE SAFE and have great behavior. Ya’ll, I have had to race people into hospitals from long distances while in far away countries. I hit an electrical time on a site one time – the house was wired-up to the house next door! I was blessed to not get hurt. Inevitably, someone will get cut or fall…kind of par for the course in a disaster area. You just want to cut down on those incidents as much as possible. Safety needs to be the rule and not the exception. Do your best to be safe. If you aren’t sure if an action is safe, ask someone who knows. And this is kind of an odd one, don’t put people on roofs who don’t need to be up there. Gravity doesn’t care if you are on a mission trip or a mountain bike – Newton’s rules still apply.
- Don’t overthink things. Yuck. Don’t be a cowboy, but also we a go-getter and a do-er. Learn that balance. Analysis by paralysis is a real thing in the mission field. Steer clear of those folks. If you see a family in need and the Lord is calling you to help, then listen to that call and talk to people in your counsel about how best to help.
- Lastly, you are going to work on some great teams that you have a great vibe with. You are going to work with some teams in which you don’t gel. I imagine that was true for God’s people in the Bible. That is ok. The end goal isn’t to make ourselves feel better. It is to bring relief and hope to those who we work with.
- Be the hands and feet of God. We are there to be party of the body of Christ. The mission field has fellowship unlike any other. You won’t always have those times in your life. Enjoy them while they last.
Pro Tip: I have gone back and forth on whether to write about this event. I am supremely uneasy with writing posts with the soul purpose of driving traffic to this site. However, I have spent a decent amount of time on the mission field, and I can offer some wisdom. That said, there will be people reading this who have spent a lifetime doing this. Their wisdom should always take priority.
