Not even the toughest-looking teenager can slip by Joan Bundy without responding to her good-natured “How are you today?”

Mrs. Bundy is a longtime resident of the Franklin Avenue neighborhood in New Orleans’ Eighth Ward, formerly known as one of the city’s roughest areas.

The neighborhood is quiet these days. After the flooding caused by Hurricane Katrina drenched the area in nearly nine feet of water in 2005, few residents returned.

Brown water lines still scar vacant houses that once had beautiful wrought iron French lace on porches or bright colors on exterior walls. Like the creeping vines that have taken over formerly manicured lawns, rust slowly chokes out the last luster of the black lace. Vibrant pinks, oranges, and blues are now faded and dirty.

After the storm, Mrs. Bundy was determined to fix up what remained of the house she had lived in for 40 years. She took all of her savings and paid a contractor to make the necessary repairs. He disappeared before completing the work, leaving Mrs. Bundy with no money and no way to return home.

“I’m a senior citizen on a fixed income, so there was no way to acquire any funds, other than making a loan, and I was not about to get into that situation,” she said.

In the midst of anxiety, a familiar passage in Psalms came to mind. “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain” (Psalm 127:1b, NIV).

She quietly left the neighborhood but knew that despite her current circumstances she’d be back.

Nearly three years later, it was time to return. The house looked much the same, sad and unfinished. During one of her neighborhood rounds, she met a local pastor who told her about Samaritan’s Purse, an organization she had supported in the past. In December, the month she returned, Samaritan’s Purse began refurbishing existing homes and building up to 50 new homes for people who still have not recovered from the storm.

After Mrs. Bundy turned in an application, a volunteer team set to work correcting faulty repairs, restoring electrical wiring and plumbing, and painting. When the final coat was applied to the purple exterior, an appreciative Mrs. Bundy’s returned home at last.

“Because of those hands of love, seeds of love have been planted into our homes, so that our homes can now truly be homes of love,” she said.

Now that she is back home, Mrs. Bundy is passing on that love to everyone in the neighborhood.

“I had the opportunity to move out of the hood and into the suburbs, but God didn’t call me to be a suburbanite,” she said. “The only other place I want to move to is my spot in heaven. Other than that, give me my city. God’s got good things in store for this area.”

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Samaritan's Purse , United States , DR Extranet , U.S. Disaster Relief , Rebuilding a Neighborhood