Eight folks from our church drove 20 hours to spend the week in New Orleans at Global Maritime Ministries – which is a ministry to the port of the New Orleans. We support this ministry financially – the director, Philip Vandercook and I went to seminary together in New Orleans. Yesterday we worked around the center cleaning and installing baseboard and other things in their new center. Today I worked on their computers and we installed security cameras and worked on their vans.
Tonight, I just finished spending 4 hours with Burmese seaman who are in port in New Orleans this week. Played ping pong with them -they are good – and watched the Jesus movie in Burmese! Now there’s some real speaking in tongues. I sure needed an interpreter. Talked with a seaman, Carl, who is Roman Catholic, talked with him about Christ a little and shared with him a Bible in Burmese and got to pray with him. His name was Carl.
Being a seaman is such a tough life. This guy’s been doing it since 1994. Found out that his mom died last year on his birthday – 3 months after the fact. Hasn’t seen his daughter (20) or his son in almost a year. Will have to do this work for another 5 years or more so he can provide for his family. Tomorrow, we’ll spend most of the day with a crew form a carnival cruise ship…
David, sorry I missed you this week. I’m headed out to Fort Worth Thursday so I won’t be able to meet up anytime. Hope you’ve had a good time down here, and thanks for coming. And I pray you guys have a safe return to Delaware. Later.