Rain and flooding here, please pray.

Dear Friends,

Let me pass on an urgent prayer request from the Hospital Loma De Luz. The hospital was innundated with rain today (28th) and much damage was done to the infrastructure that brings water and electricity to the hospital. We have heard that as many as five local people may have died yesterday as a result of the flooding in the surrounding villages. Please pray for the local people as they face huge trials in the midst of the flooding. Please pray for our missionaries at the hospital as they also face great challenges over the next few weeks. Transportation will not be possible to La Ceiba (where we are right now - taking language school) for at least several days and maybe up to two weeks - so supplies will be very short. The water delivery system and the electricity were both badly damaged in the storm. Please pray that God would provide for our dear friends as they embrace the challenge of recovering from the storm.

Thank you!
Dave and Marinajo Fields
Mariah and Benny

Here is the email that was sent out by the Cornerstone Foundation yesterday evening:

Dear Cornerstone Friends,

I was just about to write to you with a good news report on the water situation when I got news of a new problem which also involves water.

The good news: In our last email update, I mentioned some alternate / back-up water sources which didn't really produce enough water to serve our needs on a regular basis. Well, the good news is that once the rainy season rains arrived, those water sources (springs) began producing more water--enough to better handle our needs.

The bad news: Now it's raining way too much, and there's too much water. It has been raining horrendously heavily--much more so than what is normal for the rainy season. A foot of rain fell last night, with more coming down. The tremendous amount of water has overwhelmed drains and burst pipes which were unable to bear the strain of draining such a huge volume of water. The power lines are washed out in many places--some sections for hundreds of meters. Every house in Balfate has water in it, including some of the missionaries' homes. The satellite link is down off and on, depending on the thickness of the cloud cover (so not much contact with the outside world is possible). And of course the rivers are all out of their banks with bridge ramps washed out, keeping the entire area isolated. Finally, the flooding, ironically, makes finding drinkable water very difficult.

So please pray--for better weather and conditions, for God's help in making so many repairs, for the missionaries to find the Lord's help when things seem discouraging, and for God to be glorified in the midst of all. Please also pray for the many Hondurans who are cold, wet refugees from hard hit communities, for those whose mountain farms are washing away, and really for all of them. For so many of the people, who live always closer to the bone, finding ways to get warm or dry and to find food in these conditions is not so easy.

Also, there are also several missionaries who are scheduled to be flying out of San Pedro Sula in a few days and currently have no way to get there.

Please lift all of this up to the Lord. Thanks so much.

--Sally Mahoney
for Cornerstone Foundation and Hospital Loma de Luz
Tuesday 28 Oct. 2008