Update for the Fourth Week of October 2016
It was on a Wednesday that the wind began to blow. It was a category 5 typhoon named Lawin, and it blew all night. It is hard to describe to those who haven’t experienced typhoons, so I’ll just say it is not the kind of storm that you sleep through. It was the kind with which you sit up through the night and keep checking to see if your roof is still where it should be and if the ground beneath your house is being washed away.
Thursday morning the storm had passed, but it left behind a landscape that looked like it had been through a shredder; Trees were down everywhere and even bamboo stalks were snapped off. It was a real mess, but fortunately, no one in our village was injured and very few houses were damaged.
Unfortunately, other parts of northern Luzon received much more damage. 13 people were killed to the west of us. And to the east of us, the city where our helicopter is stationed received heavy damage. Almost every house was damaged, there is limited water, and there is no electricity. We praise the Lord that the helicopter was not damaged but you can see that it was a close call. The doors on the hangar were almost torn off.
• Please thank the Lord with us for his protection of us and our village.
• Please thank the Lord that all our missionaries are safe.
• Please thank the Lord that our helicopter was not damaged.
• Please pray for grace and provision for those in areas that were heavily damaged. Jared and Bana Major reported that out of 100 families in their area only three of the houses escaped damage.
Thank you for your prayers,
God bless,
Jonathan & Heidi Bamford