The past 2 weeks are honestly a blur to me, so I’ll recap as best I can!  While I was here dealing with storm issues, MJ was off packing up our house in KY.  With very few issues, MJ and the gang made it to FL a week ago Friday evening and I got my wife back and finally was able to get back in our home!  Ron and Gery headed back to AR the next morning.

We’ve had about 2 weeks of servants out in the field.  It seems like it was a month or longer.  It was a lot of stress for us, but I believe God showed up in many ways and it was a fruitful time, not just in what we got done in the field, but what’s been going on with those in Camp Calvary!

We had our first “local servant Saturday” with about 50 folks showing up from CC SRQ, Venice, and Faith Community CC in Nokomis.  The following Saturday we had 12 and this past Saturday we had 7, and so it goes.  Some locals couldn’t make it the first day and they showed up and helped on the following Monday from CC Christian Fellowship in Sarasota come down for a day.  Through the weekdays we’ve also had a few locals show up here and there.   

David from CC Philly arrived 2 weeks ago.  He immediately got busy helping and then he stayed the week.  He headed out for some family stuff but will be back mid-week.  He’s got a few other things going on but should be here off and on through our CHRISTmas break and then we’ll see what happens next year, as we’ll still be here pressing on!

Next, we had the Children’s Pastor, Garrett, & Mary from CC Destin and Chris from Panama City join us.  Garrett and Mary stayed for a few days, but they will be back with others from their church soon!  Chris stayed a couple extra days.  The worship leader at CC Venice was out of town so Chris offered to help.  There was an issue with the sound, and they were thankful that he was there to help keep things moving last Sunday!

That Friday evening, we were joined by Jason and Sammy from CC Destin.  They are both in the Navy and wanted to come down and help for the day.

This past Monday we were joined by a couple guys from CC Crystal River and 5 guys from U-Turn For Christ in Crystal River.  The U-Turn guys stayed 3 days and had to get back to prior commitments.

Here’s what’s been going on in the field:

• Since we’ve been here, I’ve talked to over 50 homeowners, and I’ve assessed over 40 of them, the others are still waiting for me to come by and a couple I’ve had to decline, for various reasons
• We’ve completed the work on 16 different homes per what they asked for
• We currently have 9 homes we’ve started on but still have more to do
• We’ve got 17 homes that are waiting for us to schedule work to be done, some small, some large
• We’ve tarped and patched roofs and siding to stop water intrusion, cut and cleared trees and vegetation, removed tons of metal from off homes and properties, began water and mold remediation that includes removing ceilings, walls, & floors and everything in between, and several other things
• I’ve spent some time going over insurance paperwork and even talked to insurance companies for the homeowner, and I’ve advised some the best I can with FEMA stuff, which constantly changes
• I’ve already discussed helping rebuild 5 or 6 homes with the homeowners, and there are others that I haven’t talked to yet, but they are already on my list of possibilities, and there will be others that need our help.
• We’ve mostly been serving at Bay Indies and a few other places nearby and I’ve looked at few homes in Bradenton, SRQ, south Venice and North Port.

We’ve been busy at Camp Calvary as well:

• Setting up 3 RVs with electric, water, and sewer and electric to our tool trailer.  I still need to work on getting the internet connected for them.
• We have everything we need to house out of town servants set up and ready to go!
• We’ve ran some new electrical circuits, added a stove and refrigerator to our new “kitchen”, installed a new water heater and set up a shower on the back porch, and mostly turned the church storage shed into a disaster relief supply shed!

We’ve got Mike from CC Clayton as our only out of town servants coming in this week so could use a few locals all week long.  We also don’t have any out-of-town volunteers Thanksgiving week, but we have a local family giving up their family vacation to come and serve with us.  After that we don’t have room for any more servants through our CHRISTmas break.  But after the first of the year, we are wide open and have more work than just Mary Jo and I can get done.  We’ve been talking to several out-of-towners about next year and we’ll see what The LORD does.

We’re mostly serving in mobile homes helping “older” folks and a lot of women living alone.  It appears that Calvary Relief is turning into a mobile home repair outfit, something I thought we’d never do! 

Here’s some stories from some of the homeowners we’ve been helping:

• One couple just moved in the week after the storm and the husband ended up having a heart attack after seeing all the damage.  He’s doing much better.  They have no insurance
• One lady just had a stroke before the storm, and now this.  She has some insurance, but not enough unless we help her with the labor
• One lady has no money and no insurance, and she had major mold in her home, which we tore out
• One lady was recently widowed and had a rising water flood so everything 4’ and below went to the curb
• One family’s house had almost 4’ of water flood it with sewage and no flood insurance.  Everything from the ceiling down goes to the curb.  Her dad died unexpectedly last week and because of issues with her mom’s health, she’s taking care of all the arrangements for her dad instead of their home.  They have children and are living in an RV in their driveway that they may lose soon.
• One man has lived in his trailer for 23 years with the wife of his youth.  She started having memory loss and he did his best to take care of her for many years and it got to be more than he could handle.  He put her in a memory care facility a couple of weeks before the storm.  He lost his roof, and his home is ruined.  He has nowhere to go and refuses to leave his wife and move back to OH with his kids, even though his wife doesn’t recognize him much anymore.  We tarped his home so he can stay there, illegally, since it’s been condemned by the city, until he figures out his next steps.  He thinks he’s got a place, but it will be 2 months before he can move in, and he has a lot of packing of his life to do
• One man keeps calling me and forgets we already fixed his leaks; he lives alone and can barely get around
• One lady just lost her husband a couple of months ago
• One widow lady had a stroke just before the storm.  She’s getting around fine, but hard to understand
• One man I’ve only talked to on the phone so far and need to get by.  Mike and Linda knocked on his door to give him one of our cards.  He’s younger than all the rest we’ve been helping, but he had a bad stroke and is in a wheelchair, living alone.  He has major damages, but I believe we can fix them, though I haven’t been able to assess his home yet.  He told me that shortly before Linda knocked on his door that he had a gun in his mouth because he was so despondent not knowing what to do.

I could go on.  Notice that all the issues that these folks are going through were on top of Ian.  No one person goes through the same storm, the same way.  We never say we know what they’re going through because we don’t!

We’ve had many opportunities to pray with folks, to encourage them, and to invite them to church, a few of them showed up this Sunday!

One day our truck was parked on one street where we’re serving, and we walked around the corner to a home, and I needed to walk back to the trailer to get something.  The homeowners I parked in front of didn’t see me coming up and were talking about us.  They said they didn’t know who we were, just some Christians that keep showing up and are going around and helping folks for free!

We’ve had several people just come up to us and say that they’ve seen and heard what we’re doing and thanked us.  We always point them back to Jesus!  It’s because of Him that we do what we do.

As you can see, we’ve been extremely busy and gotten a lot done.  I’ve been able to share what we’re doing at 3 churches and teach and share at one since we’ve been here.  Here’s the link to my sharing from CC Venice from 10-23, https://youtu.be/OfwEVlqtWNE which is also above this blog.

There’s lots of work to be done and we’ll be here for a while.  If you’re from out-of-town, pray about coming in with your family, a small group, or even yourself!

Please keep us in your prayers, the task seems impossible, but we know we can do whatever The LORD has for us to do in His strength!

If you’re interested in growing in The LORD as you selflessly serve others alongside of Calvary Relief, please let us know!  For more info on joining us, click here.

If you’re interested in helping with any of the expenses with Calvary Relief, please click here.

If there’s ever anything you need prayer about or just need to talk to someone, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us and let us know!

Here to serve and disciple until He calls us home,

Curt & Mary Jo