Katrina - Our Response

After the Wal-Mart run and drop off for our first evacuee family (mentioned earlier), we went home and felt a little better that we had done something tangible to help those in need. So . . . why did I still feel restless? Why did I still feel like I couldn't mark that task completed?

In the meantime during that first week and a half, our Pastor and others in our church were coordinating with other local congregations and charities. Together they found many, many evacuees in our area that needed help. Working together across theological and denominational lines, they formed a very organized and effective consortium. Some churches stepped up and donated warehouse space to store food in one location and furniture and house wares in another location. Some churches short on funds and physical buildings offered their manpower to staff these facilities by sorting and distributing the goods. Some churches that were blessed financially started buying what was needed. Some churches blessed with the skills started working on resource lists, basic intake forms, counseling centers, job training and staffing locations, and on and on. Some churches like ours also offered to be a "host church" to take a group or several groups of evacuees under our wing long-term and partner with them through this ordeal.

When my wife and I heard about this long-term "host church" type of arrangement, we began to pray about how we should be involved. We learned that our church had agreed to "host" a group of evacuees and they were looking for families or Bible study classes to sign up to work with individual families of evacuees. My Pastor called and asked what role we might play in this relief effort. Our family discussed what a commitment like that would take and how it would affect our lives and busy fall schedule. We had a little baby, a 4 year old, and a 1st grader. We had no idea what "long-term" meant or exactly what would be required of us and no one could answer those questions. We called some friends of ours who also felt like the responsibility of hosting a whole family of evacuees by themselves would be a little overwhelming. So, both of our families agreed to share the responsibility of helping one single family of evacuees. It felt good to e-mail our Pastor and let him know that we were stepping up to the challenge and were willing to help by being personally involved in a long-term commitment with an evacuee family.

After a few days, we learned that one group of evacuees that our church had accepted responsibility for was a large group currently staying in a hotel. Someone working with them had found an apartment complex that was willing to allow them to move in on a temporary basis and sign short-term leases.

Throughout this time period, it seemed like we received many calls and e-mails from people asking about what to do and where to take items that they had gathered. My wife is a natural at this sort of thing and when we didn't know an answer to a question, she would find out and pass the word along. Not knowing what our evacuee family would really need, we decided to go ahead and start gathering things and working our contacts of friends and associates. Pretty soon, I couldn't park my car in the garage anymore it was piled full of stuff!

Finally, we got a call that we could take the items that we had gathered to a central spot for the evacuees that we would end up hosting as a church. We were told that the apartment complex had offered some storage space on their property even though the evacuees had not signed their contracts yet. At the complex, we mostly just organized our items in the storage area. There were lots of people from our church bringing lots of different items including food, water, bedding, pillows, blankets, towels, you name it and we had it. Just as it happened over the last several days, for some reason people asked my wife and I a few questions and we helped direct traffic a little.

Talking with some of the church staff that were there at the apartment complex, I learned that our church had actually agreed to "host" about 3-4 different groups of evacuees and others in the church had already started meeting the needs of some of the other groups. However, this group of evacuees was perhaps the largest group and the closest group in proximity to the church. Our Pastor said that he had been able to recruit one point person or one family to coordinate the other groups but had been unable to find anyone to coordinate this group who would soon move into the apartment complex. He asked me if our family would be willing to coordinate. Thinking back to the discussions that my wife and I had in trying to decide what we were able to realistically do AND knowing that the results of those discussions ended in us deciding to share the responsibility of hosting one evacuee family, I told my Pastor that "Oh no, we just can't coordinate all this besides we don't know how to do that. But, we are willing to host one family."

As my wife and I drove home from the apartment complex, I just felt strange. Restless. Anxious. Unfinished. I started thinking about the past few days. I was reminded of a time the day before when my wife had made a good decision about a donated item. I thought about a question that I had answered from another church member that seemed like the right thing to do and it had worked out well. I prayed right then and asked God why I felt restless and to show me what to do. I told my wife how I was feeling and she said that she felt the same way. We ended up deciding that like it or not, whether it's convenient or not, regardless of if we have the time or not, we already were taking leadership in a sense. We already were in this thing over our heads.

When we got home, I looked up my Pastor's cell phone number and called him to tell him that we would coordinate the group of evacuees moving into the apartment complex. So, that's the story of how one little family who started off sharing the responsibility of caring for one evacuee family ended up helping to coordinate an effort for around 36 apartments holding over 75 people hosted by over 25 families and Bible study groups in our church.

I talked with one of my dear evacuee friends tonight just to check in and see how she was doing since today is the official anniversary. Ms. D was very emotional today. She has been volunteering her time at a local charity and giving back to the community. She mentioned to me that when she started volunteering she didn't know what she was supposed to do. I counseled her on something that I had heard several times -- God doesn't care as much about our ABILITY as He cares about our AVAILABILITY. I was able to share that with Ms. D with conviction since my family lived that out. We had no idea what we were getting into and no idea how to do the job we had just volunteered for. However, we were obedient to His call and made ourselves available. It wasn't easy, but He was faithful to provide "all that we can ask or imagine" (Ephesians 3:20).

Next Katrina post . . . to Apartments