Gentilly Baptist Church met Sunday morning. Pastor David Arceneaux has turned in his resignation and will be moving to Houston. He wanted to assemble as many of his people as possible to meet, worship, fellowship, and make some decisions about the property. They met in our associational office building and Freddie Arnold from our staff attended. Some 10 or 12 Gentilly members were present. Pastor Dave preached and the members formed a board of directors to make future decisions about their buildings, with Freddie and me as members.

Originally, I had planned to make that meeting, but when we discovered that Port Sulphur Baptist Church in Plaquemines Parish was meeting in a tent on their property, I wanted to be there. Pastor Lynn Rodrigue says this is their third Sunday for worship. “We packed out our tent the other Sundays,” he said, “but we lost some when the Catholic church down the street re-opened.” They had 35 or 40 for church this morning at ten o’clock.

It’s exactly 60 miles from my driveway to Port Sulphur Baptist Church. You cross the Mississippi River over the Huey P. Long Bridge, then on the West Bank Expressway take the LaFayette exit and drive south to the town of Belle Chasse. Keep going; drive another 40 miles or so downriver. On your atlas, you will see that state highway 23 mimics every turn of the Mississippi River downstream, all the way to the gulf. My map shows it as a scenic drive, which these days is a cruel joke.

The devastation from Katrina is still so evident beginning a few miles below Belle Chasse. Skeletons of houses and businesses still stand, gaunt, lifeless. Piles of trash, wrecked buildings, abandoned cars. Debris. Sadness. No stores open. Nothing but FEMA trailers.

Power company trucks and crews were out. The storm had wrecked the poles and lines, all of them leaning and twisted and useless, so crews have installed an entire new set of poles and lines on the other side of the road. Electrical power is gradually moving south.

“We are giving away food and water and materials here at the church,” Pastor Lynn Rodrigue said. “We’ve got the names of 3,000 people who’ve been by for help.” Where are they living? “In FEMA trailers.” On the drive south, I had noticed those little boxes in half the driveways, alongside mansions and shacks, and most incongruous of all, beside larger house trailers. “And we have a refrigerated trailer for the food we’re giving away.”

“We have a trailer now,” Lynn said, pointing to the little FEMA offspring in back of the ruined church buildings. “We stayed there last night for the first time.” Lynn and wife Nicole and their four small children, living in something like 240 square feet. “I’ve been commuting from where we’re living in Baton Rouge,” he said, “but now we’ll be down here so we can really minister to the people.”

The church at Port Sulphur was one of our two strongest Baptist churches in lower Plaquemines. They had nice buildings and a school which enrolled 95 students. Everything is ruined now. “A church in Virginia adopted us. They sent a team down to see our situation, including a structural engineer.” I’ll be surprised if anyone thinks these buildings are salvageable. The steel building’s girders are bent and twisted.

Looking over the congregation, I said, “Are all these your regular members?” “Yes,” he said, “except for two or three who were teachers in our school, they’re all ours.”

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Voters piled into New Orleans from every direction. Buses brought displaced New Orleanians from as far away as Atlanta. Why did you ride the bus down here when you could have voted absentee? Anthony and Frances Tasker answered that the questions being asked in the ballot application were “too personal to risk anyone getting their hands on.” Neighbors who had not seen each other since August 29 were greeting and hugging. Tears were flowing, according to those who were there.

The headline of Sunday’s paper blares out: NAGIN and underneath LANDRIEU. Subtitle: “Forman runs distant third; runoff set for May 20.”

The returns began coming in soon after polls closed at 8 pm, and the lead seesawed for a while between the top three. Then Nagin and Landrieu pulled away and Forman was never close again.

Analysts use computers these days and can tell you almost instantly who is voting for each candidate. For instance, Mayor Nagin received almost all the votes of displaced voters who had lost their homes, and he and Landrieu split the votes of African-Americans in the city. Forman’s support came almost exclusively from the “white” precincts. Even with the population of the city being less than half its normal 450,000, the turnout of registered voters was 36%, compared with 45% in the last election when life was normal and everyone was at home.

As the paper reported, Nagin received 41,489 votes for 38%, Mitch Landrieu 31,499 (29%), Ron Forman 18,734 (17%), and Rob Couhig 10,287 (10%).

You have to be a little stunned at the small number of votes some of the candidates thought to be among the top tier received. When the media would select the top one-third of the twenty-something candidates, they brought together Rev. Tom Watson, Virginia Boulet, and Peggy Wilson. For all their trouble, the votes they garnered were: Watson 1,264 (1%), Boulet 2,367 (2%), and Wilson 772 (1%).

And Clerk of Criminal Court Kimberly Williamson Butler, she of “martyrdom” fame, how did she do? She received 793 votes, or 1%. James Arey is a familiar and pleasant voice on our NPR station in New Orleans, based at the University of New Orleans. He resigned his job to run for mayor. Poor guy. He shoulda kept his day job. Only 99 votes.

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This week the New Orleans City Council voted 7-0 to set August 29 as the date when homeowners will have to have their ruined homes restored, otherwise face demolition. If not restored, they must be cleaned, gutted, and boarded up, or risk having the city seize and demolish them. Unless this is done, the council said, mold-infested homes can become environmental biohazards that will discourage others from returning and rebuilding, thus slowing the recovery of the city.

Councilmember Jay Batt, who introduced the motion, said, “It’s not fair to others to let these houses languish.” A website will be set up for those needing outside help. And a reviewing panel will make the final decision on special cases.

August 29 is one year from the date of Katrina and the flooding which followed. Councilmembers say that’s plenty of time. One day after the council passed this ordinance, Mayor Ray Nagin protested that it is not enough time, that many people, particularly older citizens, need more time. He threatened to veto that action of the council. Since it takes only 5 votes to override his veto, it appears to be a meaningless threat.

This week we heard of a youth group coming in the summer from a church in Georgia bringing lawn mowers and weed eaters. Great idea. On my daily drive up Elysian Fields Avenue to the lakefront, I notice waist high weeds in most yards. My impression is that weedeaters are more practical. I’d hate to push a lawnmower over those yards without a clue what kind of debris lurks underneath the thick grass. Many homes have not been touched in the eight months since the hurricane, and it could be dangerous.

I love the way the Lord works. Friday morning a pastor sat in my office and told of a Georgia church coming to help restore his buildings and his home. He said, “We had five churches to adopt us, but they’re the only one following through.” He said, “Soon we’re going to be needing pews.” I promised to keep my eye out for churches wishing to give away their old pews. Two hours later, a lady from a church in Ellijay, Georgia, called wondering if we needed 24 pews they had to give away. Saturday evening, Margaret and I bumped into the local pastor and I told him how the Lord was providing.

Today, Saturday, is the long-awaited election for the mayor and council of New Orleans, along with two sheriffs, seven tax assessors, and other offices. No one knows how the displaced citizens who voted absentee have voted, or how the citizens who are driving in from surrounding parishes will vote, or what role race will play in the election. Secretary of State Al Ater has set up headquarters in the Marriott Hotel with his entire staff to oversee this election. Normally, the clerk of Criminal Court would do that. But Kimberly Butler, the clerk, decided to run for mayor, and that put her in the position of overseeing the election in which she was a candidate. In addition, she engaged in such shenanigans with the judges that they jailed her for contempt. She came out claiming martyr status in the same league as Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, Jr. So, Mr. Ater is in charge and everyone is glad he is. Normally, the secretary of state position is so obscure most people can’t even name its occupant. Look for Mr. Ater to run for higher office himself next time.

“Vote against the incumbents,” shouted one ad in Friday’s newspaper. Another ad, placed by “Citizens for Change,” urged everyone to vote for the incumbent mayor, Ray Nagin. How that would bring about change they didn’t say.

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(We’ve just sent this message out to all our pastors and churches that make up the Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans. We suggested they photocopy it and distribute to their members.)

In October of 2004 at our associational meeting, I began my message to you with a burden. The biggest surprise I’d had on becoming your director of missions six months earlier was the ISOLATION of our churches. Each congregation was doing its own ministry, its members complete strangers to members of the other churches. Even the pastors barely knew each other; we might count 15 at our monthly ministers’ meetings which lasted one hour.

One result of the isolation of our churches was the INSULATION of our members. We insulate a house to keep the world outside. We insulate our members from the outside community when we occupy their time with meetings inside the organization and jobs inside the building. Ask our people to go down the street and meet their neighbors and most will tell you they don’t have time.

If one of Satan’s methods is to divide God’s people, and it is, he can check that one off his list, I told you. Because we’ve done it to ourselves! We were not working together. The result of that was a complete ABDICATION of our assignment to be salt and light in this community. We were failing the Lord, the world, and one another.

Normally, when a preacher unburdens himself in a sermon, he ends with the remedy. He tells how the Lord wants to correct the bad situation. But at that meeting, I said, “I don’t know what the answer is. I do not know what God is going to do to get us into the community as salt and light.” And that’s where we left the matter.

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Recently, we quoted some of our pastors who feared an outbreak of some kind of respiratory epidemic due to the mold and mildew in the air. Wednesday’s newspaper reports that a check of 56,000 emergency room visits in local hospitals from October through March showed only a slight increase in this area. One percent increase for asthma and 7 percent increase for respiratory infections. Not nearly the drastic increase many had predicted and all had feared. That’s great news.

State leaders of emergency preparedness told a state senate committee in Baton Rouge this week that with the increase of deadly hurricanes predicted for the next few years, residents should be planning to evacuate coastal areas–including New Orleans–early and often. In particular, those living in FEMA trailers would be most vulnerable and should not hang around until the last minute.

Slidell police have arrested a couple of people for selling FEMA trailers. The only good news–and it’s not much–is that they are not local citizens, but from an adjoining state. One man was a contractor for FEMA who delivered the trailers, and the other was nabbed for receiving stolen property. They were selling these modular homes for $5,000 each, a bargain by any accounting since FEMA pays the supplier over $3,000 a month to provide and set up the trailers. These characters would have come out better if they’d gone into business as suppliers.

In a newspaper article listing persons arrested for insurance fraud–claiming to have suffered hurricane damage when they hadn’t–an unusual crime is listed. Carey Watis, 42, of the community of Convent, LA, was arrested for stealing flooded and abandoned vehicles off the streets of New Orleans, hauling them to his place of business and crushing them, then selling them for scrap. He would reap $150 per car. For this crime, he faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $3,000 per car. Meanwhile, the city is hiring a contractor to haul off those same cars and is paying to have it done, up to $1,000 per car. One wonders if there is any sanity left in this city.

On Wednesday night’s television, two stations were running programs aimed toward helping locals deal with the stress of post-Katrina life adjustment. It reads like the treatment they are presenting is simply getting people to tell their stories. We’ve found at our Wednesday pastors meeting there really is therapy in just hearing what someone else is going through or came through.

Tuesday night, I gave our out-of-town guests from a large Texas church two choices on where to have dinner. You can have high cuisine or good eatin’, I told them. The high cuisine, I said, is LaParvenu, a victorian home turned into a restaurant, owned by the chef who used to run a famous eatery in New Orleans. The good eatin’ is called Comeback Inn, where the po-boys are big, delicious, messy, and fried. They opted for LaParvenu. We ate on the front porch and the food was beautiful, delicious, and somewhat pricey. I noticed at the top of the menu in fine print this line: “Separate checks for $2 extra.” I love the restaurant but I was offended by that. Just one more way of squeezing a little more money from the consumer. I suppose they learned that art from the oil companies. Let OPEC sneeze and we pay another 10 cents per gallon. I keep reminding myself to ask Guidestone to invest my retirement account in oil stocks.

“COME AND SEE.”

The other evening I caught the last half of a movie on television in which Kenneth Branagh and Cynthia Nixon portray Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt in the days after he contracted polio, as they discover the rehabilitative powers of the “warm springs” in the Georgia community by that name. He bought the small cluster of houses and pools that made up that facility, and then started looking for financial support. On learning that a convention of medical doctors and researchers was convening in Atlanta, Eleanor and Franklin drove up and invaded the meeting, interrupting a speaker who was delivering a paper. Flashing that famous FDR grin, the future president charmed the crowd, told of the powers of the waters at Warm Springs, and gave them a simple invitation. I was fully expecting to hear him tell them, “We need financial support.” Instead, he said, “If this interests you, we invite you to come and see for yourselves.”

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Wednesday morning, on my way to First Baptist-LaPlace for our weekly ministers’ gathering, I found myself wondering if anyone would show up. I missed last Wednesday, in Jackson for our friend’s funeral. And last week, we cut the meetings to two hours, from 10 to noon. So, perhaps the interest is dwindling. As always, I sent up a brief reminder to the Father that “This is yours; it’s not about me; let this weekly meeting continue as long as it meets the needs of even one person.”

It may have been our best meeting ever. Some fifty people were there, including several for the first time.

We were thrilled to welcome home Rev. and Mrs. Johnny Jones, pastor of the ill-fated Free Mission Church in the Lower 9th Ward, and now living in the Fort Knox, Kentucky, area where their son is a chaplain. “We had a meeting last Sunday of about 25 members,” Brother Johnny said, “in front of our building.” They’re meeting again tonight (Wednesday) at Shoney’s on the West Bank. Both the church and the Joneses’ home have been gutted out and await restoration. Since they are in the tragic Lower 9th, no one knows to this day what the city is going to allow or require for rebuilding. My guess is everyone is waiting for Saturday’s mayoral election, and then for the new mayor to make this call.

James “Boogie” Melerine, pastor of the Delacroix-Hope church, now meeting in a carport in the community of St. Bernard, reported, “We had 77 for church Sunday.” They were running 25 before Katrina. “We’ve had eight adults saved recently.” The Presbyterian church in that community may be for sale, and they’re in conversations with the half-dozen members there about buying it. “To their credit,” he said, “they’re spending their insurance money to restore the church before discussing with us about purchasing it.” Someone asked what they planned to name the “new” church. A nearby bayou is one possibility, but he said, “Some want to name it ‘Katrina.'” The laughter that provoked made me wonder if he was serious. He seemed to be.

That’s the way with Christians, isn’t it. Taking the worst flung at them and turning it into a badge of honor. Like the cross. Like Good Friday. Like Paul reading his resume’ in II Corinthians 11:23-28 where he lists as his credentials the suffering he endured for Jesus’ sake.

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In Monday night’s mayoral debate, moderators Norman Robinson and Chris Mathews tried. They pushed and pushed the candidates but got little of substance from any of them. Each had his talking points and strayed little from them. On Tuesday’s op-ed pages, the columnists called them on it.

Stephanie Grace’s column was headed, “Candidates duck rebuilding debate.” Early on, she says, there was hope that the massive needs of this city would provoke vigorous debate over the decisions the city would have to make on land use. Shall we turn the lowest sections of the city from residential neighborhoods into parks or industrial development? It seems the candidates are afraid to take the most reasonable stand, that some areas should be deemed unsafe at any cost and left alone. In order to be elected, they take the path of least resistance. “Trust me with your vote,” they imply, “and I’ll do the right thing later.”

Columnist Jarvis DeBerry told the kind of candidate he was looking for, the man or woman who would capture his vote. “Anybody who steps up and offers me the bitter-tasting, hard-to-stomach truth…will have my support. And I’ll be happy to give it.” Alas, no one of the two dozen candidates qualified, he says. “Don’t get me wrong,” DeBerry writes. “I understand that at its most basic level, a political campaign is nothing more than an elaborate version of the note that gets passed to the cute girl in the 7th grade reading class: ‘Do you like me? Check yes or no.'” None of the mayoral candidates want to say anything that will offend. “We’re being talked to as if we’re children, children who are too immature to be told how dire our situation really is, too petulant and self-centered to appreciate how much sacrifice our recovery will require of us.”

The Times-Picayune has just won two Pulitzers. One was awarded for meritorious public service for the paper’s coverage of Katrina and its aftermath. The other was given for distinguished reporting of breaking news, again for Katrina. I notice that the Sun Herald, newspaper of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, received the public service award, too. That should not imply that the way to get a Pulitzer is to have a major catastrophe occur on your watch; many papers do not rise to the occasion the way these two did.

On Elysian Fields Avenue Monday morning, the wrecking machines were tearing down the beloved Baptist church on that street. Ironic how a grand edifice like that, one which has stood imposingly on that corner for over 40 years, can be reduced to a pile of concrete and rubble so quickly. Ironic and sad. I expect a new, smaller, more functional building to go up on that corner before long, and won’t we all be glad.

Perhaps the weirdest moment in Monday night’s mayoral debate came when each candidate was allowed to ask another a question, and Peggy Wilson asked incumbent Mayor Ray Nagin if he really wants all the welfare cheats, the pimps, the drug dealers, the murderers back. “Do you want those people back?” Nagin answered, “I want everybody to come back to the city.” Then he added, “The ones I’m not excited about coming back are the people that have been involved in very serious crimes.”

People ask me who I’m voting for. I live in River Ridge, in Jefferson Parish, not in New Orleans. I wish I did live there, just to vote this Saturday.

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Pastor Tony Merida got it right today. This young man of God, in the second year of his first pastorate, is so solid in his presentation, so sound in his theology, and so right in his connection with the congregation of the First Baptist Church of Kenner, it’s pure joy to hear him. His message on the resurrection of Jesus was precisely what I needed to hear after burying a good friend and a dear brother this week. I pray that I shall live boldly and never fear death, which if the Gospels are to be believed, is a conquered enemy.

Tony’s sense of humor is so refreshing. Referring to the John 20 scene where Peter and John rush to the tomb to find it empty and the Lord’s grave clothes flat and the head towel folded neatly by itself, Tony called that two miracles. “The Lord was risen and a single man folded his clothes.”

Early this morning after spending time in the Word and then on the floor with my exercises, I walked on the Mississippi River levee, caught a quick shower, then rushed to LaFreniere Park for the 7 am Easter Sunrise Service conducted by the Lutheran church. The people were all leaving. “I thought it started at seven,” I said to two ladies decked out in bright Easter colors. “Six-fifteen,” one said. “The one in the cemetery starts at seven.” It would be half over by the time I got there. As I drove away, they called out a bright, “Happy Easter.”

This Monday night at 8 pm Central, the debate of the candidates for New Orleans mayor goes national. Chris Mathews and MSNBC will broadcast this show, and it should be worth watching. Sunday’s Times-Picayune says some of the candidates are through playing nice and have started making accusations. Ron Forman accuses Mitch Landrieu of never meeting a tax he didn’t like when he was in the state legislature. Landrieu fires back that Forman sure did like to receive the money from those taxes at the various Audubon enterprises he oversaw. Peggy Wilson is predicting that she, the official Republican nominee, will meet Mayor Nagin in the runoff. The newspaper has endorsed Forman but finds a lot it likes in Rob Couhig, Virginia Boulet, and Rev. Tom Watson.

Sewell Cadillac, the prestigious downtown dealership, lost a lot of great automobiles to the Katrina thing when as many as 90 police officers helped themselves to vehicles for transportation in and out of the city. Attorney General Charles Foti is investigating and it’s still to be seen what recommendations he will make. In the meantime, Sewell has decided to capitalize on the event. Billboards going up around town announce: “New Orleans’ Finest Drive Sewell.” Police Chief Warren Riley smiles about it and says, “It’s good advertising, a stroke of genius, really. A good-humored joke. It was smart of them to use us to their own benefit.”

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Originally, I had planned to leave Saturday, April 8, in late afternoon driving toward Charlotte, NC, to visit son Marty and his family before heading back to Anderson University Monday night for Tuesday’s speaking assignments, then back to New Orleans. The death of my brother Charlie that Saturday morning changed everything. For the whole family, of course. I left Sunday morning and drove to Nauvoo, Alabama, visited with Charlie’s wife Carolyn and their sons Patrick, Russell, and Chris, then spent the night with my folks. Once I learned that they were scheduling the funeral later in the week following an autopsy on Monday, I continued with the Anderson University assignment. So, Monday morning, I drove to Anderson, SC, and had a wonderful time Tuesday morning speaking to the student body, then to a group of administrators and pastors.

I’ll pause here long enough to share the gist of my message to the students. This was a missions-oriented service, and everyone knew my message would be related to the New Orleans situation. I said, “I’d like to start a conversation today, one I hope you will continue among yourselves. I’d like to ask you five questions.”

“One. Do you think God knew Hurricane Katrina was going to happen and do the damage that it did? The reason I ask is there is a new theology around called ‘Open Theism’ which claims that since something has not occurred yet, it’s impossible for God to know it.” I shared with them God’s call on my life to become director of missions for the Baptist churches of New Orleans 18 months before Katrina, and the story of Patricia Prechter (told here several days ago) who said God led her to join the National Guard in 1978 so she would be the chief medical officer on duty in the Superdome for those 10 days following Katrina. What do you think, does He know?

“Two. Do you think Katrina was God’s judgement on New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast for sin? Many have said so.” I told them of my letter to the editor in the aftermath of Katrina addressing this, pointing out that I am amazed at the certainty of those who know it was His judgment as well as those who are sure it was not. I suggested it may be; we deserve it; let us seek the Lord. If one says the storm was God’s judgment on New Orleans, he should be prepared to explain why the storm spared the French Quarter and destroyed the poorest section of town. “If the Lord should mark iniquity, who would stand?” Psalm 130:3 puts it well.

“Three. Is Romans 8:28 still in effect?” I told ways in which God had brought good from the destruction of Katrina.

“Four. Are you willing to trust God with your future?” After all, He knows the plans He has for you and you don’t. Can you trust Him?

And five. “Will you pray for us in New Orleans?”

I left Anderson Tuesday around 2:30 and drove straight through to Jackson, Mississippi, arriving around 10 pm dead tired. I was so tired that when two hotels in a row had no non-smoking rooms left, I took a smoking room just to have a bed. Big mistake. I was had trouble breathing all night and determined never to do that again.

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Yesterday, we held the appreciation event for First-Responders in the New Orleans Arena. I have no idea how many of our heroes got the message and attended. Fewer than we had hoped, obviously. But we had a great turnout of volunteers from various churches and the fellowship was great, and the heroes who did attend seem to have been touched by the kindnesses and gifts they received. Thanks to Cherry Blackwell and her team of volunteers for overseeing this.

Saturday was a doubly sad day for our family.

Around 8 o’clock that morning, my sister Patricia called from north Alabama to say that our youngest brother Charlie had had a heart attack and was being rushed to the Jasper hospital. At nine o’clock, she called back to say he did not make it, that he was dead on arrival. We were stunned. Age 62, the youngest of Mom and Dad’s six children. Charlie had lots of health issues and had been on disability for years, but he was not an invalid. In fact, Mom said he was at their house Friday, visiting, being his jovial self.

You can get a good snapshot of Charlie if you go to our website www.joemckeever.com and read his comments left at the end of various articles, usually signed Charles. He always says some variation of how proud they are of me, how he expected no less, how I’m following in the footsteps of our terrific Dad.

Charlie and Carolyn have three sons, Patrick, Russell, and Chris, and I don’t know, maybe 6 grandchildren, including Chris’ triplets. Burial at Nauvoo, Alabama, later this week after the autopsy.

Mickey Brunson died Saturday also. Mrs. W. C. “Bill” Brunson was the receptionist at First Baptist Church of Jackson, MS, in the early 1970s when I was on staff. A dearer, classier, kinder, more gracious human never existed. The funeral is set for Wednesday morning at that church. Depending on when Charlie’s service is set for, I plan to make it.

A double-whammy. If it were not for the promise of the Lord that “whoever believes on the Son of God shall never die,” I don’t know how we could handle these blows.

Turning to the news today….

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