Patient. Grateful. Welcoming. That’s how Orlin Martens, a plumber from Inman, Kan., described the families he helped in Bastrop, Tex. in mid-March as a Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) volunteer. Those families had been without water for more than...
MDS volunteer Doug Casey shares a smile with resident of Bastrop, Texas, after restoring water in his home. On the last day of their weeklong volunteer service in Bastrop, Texas, Jim Ensz and Doug Casey were helping a woman with disabilities who...
Sharon Taylor is home. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, despite Hurricane Harvey, despite a disability that causes her back to hurt, despite losing all but two of her beloved seven pets. “I guess it’s true that what doesn’t kill you makes you...
During this time of pandemic, MDS’s projects are all shut down until it is safe to resume work. Until that time, we are re-publishing stories of recovery and restoration from the past—stories that remind of us there’s hope, even in the most...
When Hurricane Harvey finally swirled away from the Texas coast in August 2017, Pete Villarreal went to inspect his mobile home in Victoria. He recalls the painful sight: “Large branches from some big trees fell on the roof and punctured it. Then...
Sometimes, when Roxy Sanchez pulls into her driveway, she pauses: “I just sit there and look at my home. I’m finally home,” she says. In Bloomington, Texas, the road to get there has been long, and it has forever changed her faith in God. When...
William Stutzman A quick introduction. I, William, am “Bill”. My left-handed uncle Merle is the one called “Lefty”. “A hurricane’s tempest contains an ocean’s worth of water.” In late August of 2017 Hurricane...
Eddie Garcia was one of the last people to leave Rockport, Texas, hours before Hurricane Harvey made landfall in the community on August 25, 2017. “I almost stayed,” Garcia said, “but something told me I better get out of there.” He went to...
Bloomington, Tex. — At the Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) project site in Victoria County where people are just beginning to recover from Hurricane Harvey, a sign on the wall reads: “True service is love in working clothes.” And sometimes...
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