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Posted by: David Bunch

We awoke yesterday morning to sunshine, and what a welcome site that was! Although it's hot and some places in the Baton Rouge area still have no electricity, we do not feel as though we are experiencing any difficulty at all when we see the absolute devastation in New Orleans and other regions of the Gulf Coast.

We concentrate a lot on New Orleans, but Mississippi took a direct hit and parts of Alabama are not unaffected.

The situation in New Orleans is dire, however, because as Brad pointed out it is one large, concrete bowl or swimming pool holding waters that continue to rise. Please pray that this disaster will be mitigated as much as possible. The Bible instructs us to pray for those in authority, and now is a good time to heed that advice. They need wisdom to make the right decisions.

Bro. Danny Smith is director of Compassion services International (CSI), which is the UPCI's response team to disasters worldwide. They recently did a tremendous job in the areas affected by the tsunamis. Here's what he has to say:

Many UPCI churches and constituents were seriously impacted throughout lower
Louisiana, MS and AL. Initial reports are that one MS church is totally
destroyed. Tonight we are gathering our resources to launch a Compassion
Services
International Emergency Relief project. Therefore, Bro. Haney and
Bro. Howell
have ordered an immediate initiative by CSI. I am opening a
command post here
in an office at our Denham Springs church. Our church is
one of the few
buildings in the parish that has electricity. We will send
out assessment teams
and need to raise substantial funds to provide
assistance to victims of the
disaster.

Please pray for three things:
1) For the victims
2) For CSI; that we can be a blessing and big help to
thousands and that we
can raise enough funds to do what needs to be done.
3) That we can get our electricity back on SOON.

We are setting up
the UPCI website to take your secure online credit card
contributions.

Last night we had an emergency CSI meeting in Denham Springs. We are
ramping
up for the CSI SMART Team to strike out by tomorrow for a 5-7 day
assessment
trip throughout all the affect areas of LA, MS, AL, FL. We will
come back
with a comprehensive report as to how we all can get involved and
provide
assistance to the victims. Our focus is to provide immediate relief
to our
churches, pastors and their constituents; then to others. We are
setting up a
warehouse in Denham Springs to receive donated goods such as
water, food, tarps,
tents and other emergency items. Then, we need to raise
funds to help expedite
all this.

As soon as I have additional information, I will provide the link to the secure online site where you can send your contributions, and ways to possibly send dry goods and provisions to those areas affected most.

Thank most of all for your prayers.