The rubble

July 14

The rubble

At four fifteen I woke up Tuesday morning and got ready in the dark. Backpack was already packed so I headed out to the dining hall where I saw a light on. Eduardo was in there packing up sandwich lunches, chips, and sodas in a cooler so I helped him load it into the Trooper. One by one the team straggled out into the cold morning, drinking some coffee with us in the mess hall, then loading up in the car. 

Time to hit the road: 5:00 sharp.

Destination: Earthquake destroyed city of Pedernales on the coast.

I notice large cracks running through the road as we get closer. Bumpy ride here but what am I to expect to have happened there? I hear stories of the “waves of earth” rippling through the land and destroying everything- and swallowing other things whole. I see tents and bamboo houses lining the road: whole communities now congregating together because they're too afraid to go back to the city. What is going to be there? What am I to expect?

We arrived after a six hour ride in the Trooper- two in front, three in back- to a church in Pedernales where Eduardo is friends with the pastor. 

We look out over the land and crumbling buildings stare right back. An empty lot is being carved by large land movers for government housing. Properties have been abandoned, half standing structures and piles of rubble.

The pastor, Carlos, told us of the destruction there, what he has been doing for relief, and how the plan is coming to rebuild. We showed him plans drawn up of a $2.5k bamboo house Eduardo’s brother made for the project, which impressed this pastor and fit the needs better than any he had been presented with before. His kind wife showed her love by smiling and hugging us even without any English to converse with. 

We moved on to another pastor’s church, and adjoining house, out in a slum. Tents mixed in with shabby dilapidated structures crowded the valley as far as I could see. 

This church’s four brick wall had fallen. It looked as if they had patched some repairs in the rafters and had started replacing some walls with green bamboo logs. 

In one room adjoining the sanctuary was the pastor’s family’s living quarters. Clothes were in piles, two beds were given privacy by a stack of belongings, and gaps were in the walls before the sheet metal ceiling met it. The stench of waste constantly clung to the house and vats of ‘clean’ water were being collected inside their bamboo fence where old pair-less shoes hung. Eduardo choked up as he saw his Brother’s living conditions as his heart went out to him saying,“this brother hurts me, hurts my heart.” 

We toured around the broken city, seeing the condemned buildings and missing walls on the way to our motel then had our sack lunches after we got settled. 

Back out to the community we went, visiting a destroyed church. The pastor met us out at the site with some of its church members as they explained how the earthquake had affected their lives to us. One of the families lived in a tarp tent beside the bamboo structure recently made to house Sunday School.

This family is copying the architecture of it to rebuild all the fallen walls of their devastated house nearby. They had nothing anymore, no house and no walls on their church, but they insisted they rebuild the church first. We noticed they rather having a meeting place for their Body of Christ more than rebuilding their own homes. 

Another car ride led us to the next church building, where a community has sought refuge. Where a wall used to be, eight tents of ministers families line up, facing the ocean out the new “windows” made in the opposing wall. A tent city neighbors the structure now, 70 people now all sharing three bathrooms, yet all live in what seems to be joy and cleanliness. I never saw a dirty child. 

How do we deal with such poverty? What is there to do? The entire coast of Ecuador has been tossed around since April- more than two thousand aftershocks counted now. They are out of the shock of losing their homes, but now need somewhere to go to rebuild. They can't stay in the tents forever. 

We need builders to go help Eduardo come alongside these people to rebuild their homes and churches. 

We need prayer warriors to cry out to the Lord for the spread of his Gospel through these hard times. 

We need to go serve Ecuador. 

“Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him?”

 James 2:5

-my heart is not afraid