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A Report from Thailand on Tsunami Relief March 2005 Below is an article I posted in January regarding our pending trip to Thailand to help with the tsunami relief. In it I reflect the shock we all felt over the sudden deaths of more than 150,000 Asian people. Imagine our sorrow upon seeing the number of fatalities rise to nearly 300,000. The figures vary but they seem to fall between 250 and 289 thousand with as many as 225,000 of them from Indonesia alone. Our journey took us to Chiang Mai in Thailand as more than 300 missionaries gathered for a previously scheduled conference. Most of those 300 live in or near the disaster areas affected by the tsunami and a number of those missionaries were among the first responders to assist in the rescue and recovery work. In early February we convened all our personnel and a dozen of us comprising a team of experience counselors, some trained in professional trauma and crisis recovery, met with these field staff and responders to assess their emotional and spiritual condition. We met some remarkable people. And we heard some incredible stories. They had spent long days for most of the previous weeks assisting in the search for the missing and trying to reunite separated family members. They distributed water, food, clothes and medical supplies. They built temporary shelters, acted as translators for American aid teams, served as guides, provided child care, gave assistance to emergency medical efforts, and sat with the grieving comforting the survivors over the loss of family members and loved ones. They had encountered piles of corpses, seen mass graves, walked among the devastated villages, searched through the rubble in hopes of finding one more weakened person. Our staff sprayed mosquito repellant to help control disease, worked in tent cities built for the thousands of homeless, and established a center for the long term counseling and support of those suffering from severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms. They are still there serving the survivors, providing therapy and replacing homes and boats to help the homeless and to restore the economy. It was a privilege to get to know these people. We heard scores of wonderful stories from relief team members from India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia as well as from Thailand. Among the highlights of our time with them was the honor of being able to hand deliver more than $10,000 given by friends and neighbors here in the Washington-Oregon area to the relief effort. I was authorized to distribute the funds according to my judgment of where it would do the most good and I was able to assign funds to all four of these nations. I was also carrying a bag of Beanie Babies and children's books that went to the teams from Indonesia and Thailand. Our time together in Chiang Mai allowed the relief workers some respite from their work. To a person they seemed to enjoy the break for good food, a few days of relaxation and lots of fellowship and group worship. Afterward some returned to their homes in China, Cambodia, Korea and other places and some returned to their relief work in the disaster areas. Early this week, the news announced that Indonesia has been hit again by another earthquake, this time a 8.7, and so far the death toll has exceeded 1000. This time the Indonesians have been spared another deadly tsunami but the quake itself is bad enough. Some of our relief teams are still at work supporting the victims of the December tsunami and now they will be throwing themselves again into helping the survivors of this new tragedy. I heard yesterday from a project team leader in Indonesia who has dispatched workers to this new site. Please keep them in your prayers as well as the residents of Nias Island off the west coast of Sumatra where this earthquake has been felt the most. Its hard to imagine a greater display of the love of God than you see in the actions of these relief workers. Many of them have given of their own limited finances to travel to Phuket or Banda Aceh or other sites along the Indian Ocean rim to help total strangers just because they know God would want them to. They have been exhausted, put in long days and weeks, seen nightmarish things, gone hungry and slept in primitive situations all because it needs to be done. I have a belief that too often we restrict our good works to only those efforts that seem to have a direct religious pay off. It'll get somebody saved, or persuades them of our doctrine, or grows our church or increases our finances or shows us in a good light to others. We act with an ulterior motive in what is eventually our own interest. But when Jesus tells the story of the separation of the goats and the sheep, the saints who are commended for giving to Him, and feeding Him, and clothing Him, and so forth respond by asking Him, "Lord when did we do all this for you?" He answers by saying "In as much as you did it to the least of these, you did it to me." The believers who are praised by Jesus for their caring of others had no idea that what they were doing would somehow be credited to their service for Christ. They didn't do what they did for some ulterior motive to earn spiritual brownie points or to buy themselves some enhanced status in the Kingdom. What they did they did simply because it was the right thing to do. Helping people in need is the right thing to do regardless of whether you get credit for it in this life or whether it promotes your cause, benefits your organization or makes you look better. Jesus knows our hearts and His commendation will be tied to our faithfulness in showing the compassion of He who loved us while we were still sinners and gave His life for us. Cathy and I will be continuing our work with missionaries later this year as we have an assignment to visit staff in several countries of southeast Europe and Turkey. Some of these face very difficult situations too. They aren't dealing with tsunamis, but some live with hostility, discrimination, isolation, discouragement and a lack of resources including the money to even afford the basics to support their families. If you know a dedicated missionary who is serving God overseas please encourage them, certainly with regular prayer, but also with funds and letters and occasional gifts. It is a sad fact of missions life that far too many people that promise support to the missionary in preparation will drop their support during the first year leaving the worker in the field without the funds to do the work they (and you) agreed needed doing. Help stand with these people. They value your support very much. And if you don't have someone in particular to support you are quite welcome to support us as we work with dozens of missionaries and every dollar you contribute to Hi-Venture Ministries reaches out to build the Church of God by strengthening the people of God in many nations. In His Grace, Mark January 2005 This
is an Urgent appeal for the Asian Earthquake and Tsunami Relief Work Dear Friends, Will you help? We are all in shock at the loss of more than 150,000 lives from the Asian earthquake and tsunami. Many more will die without food, shelter and medical services. Now rescue and relief workers are trying to bring aid to millions of the needy. Yet the relief workers are suffering. The death and devastation is overwhelming many of these workers who are overcome with feelings of helplessness and exhaustion. We know that exposure to these horrific conditions will scar the helpers. On Friday, New Years Eve, my wife, Cathy, and I were contacted and asked to come to Thailand. I am a professional counselor with crisis incident training. An interdenominational Seattle based ministry with hundreds of missionaries residing in Thailand, Indonesia, India and other southeast Asian areas have asked us to meet with their personnel, especially those involved in the relief work, to help them not become victims themselves. Cathy and I have just returned within the past month from meeting with missionaries and local Christian leaders in Turkey, Poland, Ireland, Wales and England. Our mission was to encourage and strengthen the work of God and His workers in these countries. Now we are asked to help with the Asian crisis and we need your prayers and your support. This emergency won't wait and the need is now. We believe God wants us in Thailand right away. We have no money for another trip so soon, nevertheless, we will be making a commitment later today trusting that the Lord will provide the money we need. We are also believing that He will provide extra funds so we don't go empty handed but will bring a gift to help in the rescue and recovery efforts. Will you consider helping the rescue effort by agreeing to pray for us from now until the middle of February? And would you consider providing financial support, not only for our expenses related to getting to Thailand, but also for the relief effort going on now? This emergency requires acting urgently for us to get to Thailand in time. Our budget is expected to be about $3000 but we want to bring as much additional aid as possible. We are scheduled to meet with more than 200 American workers, many of whom will have labored among the dead and the homeless. Some have seen unspeakable things. All have had their hearts broken. I hope you will understand this type of appeal. It may not be the best way to ask for funds but I could think of no better way to mobilize an immediate response to this massive tragedy. I hope you can help with a check right away. If you seen this appeal after we leave for Thailand we can still send a gift and we will make sure it gets to those in need. And please keep us and our team in your prayers as we go to Thailand. Call or write with questions. Or send a check immediately to Hi-Venture Ministries Asian Relief Fund at 6712 NE 162nd Street, Vancouver, WA. 98686. Hi-Venture is a 501 (c) 3 charity and all gifts are tax-deductible. Thank you and may God bless you for your compassion. |
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