Hot on the heels of a great time with friends visiting last week was a pair of national disasters.
The first occurred about 2:30am in the morning, Saturday. Centered to the south of us a considerable distance, an earthquake rated about a 6 on the Richter scale struck. Thankfully there was only one fatality and a few injuries, though there were plenty of buildings damaged including some of our partner church parishes. I’m helping to determine if there is any assistance we can provide to those in need during this difficult time. Earthquakes are common in this part of the world and so they don’t receive much press coverage (locally) unless there is a significant loss of life or damage. Like many other earthquakes in recent weeks which I’ve ignored as too far away to be of concern, this one will likely slip under the radar pretty quickly. It just happened to be a bit closer to home.
The second disaster occurred near the end of Saturday. Approximately 170 people were killed after a soccer match in East Java. A close game led to protests by fans, which created a ruckus deemed problematic by police, who used tear gas to try and disperse the crowd. Unfortunately, this caused a panic and a rush for the exit, which apparently is where most of the fatalities occurred.
Please keep families in prayer tonight as they deal with one or both of these tragedies. We pray for the peace that only can come from God the Father through knowledge of God the Son provided by God the Holy Spirit would be received and lives transformed forever.
The Nelson Family Indonesia 