Next week will mark the eight-year anniversary of Hurricane Matthew striking our island. I started writing these weekly messages at that time, as a way to share information to those somehow connected to the island. These posts conveyed updates on progress during the recovery, and they provided my perspective as a pastor as I saw the community work together in beautiful ways to alleviate suffering and damage. In the years since, as so many have moved off the island, only to be replaced by newcomers who had no experiences tied to that seminal event, my prayer was that we maintain the sense of community that Matthew highlighted.
Today, a week after Helene made her presence known, first with a tornado, and then with winds that knocked down hundreds of trees and left us without power for five days, I can state that we have successfully kept that sense of community. From the need to clear roads and debris, to offering water and electricity to neighbors who had neither, to coming together for a community meal when freezers without power could no longer keep food frozen, to simply checking in on those who were most vulnerable, our community demonstrated love for our neighbors. Thankfully, the damage to homes was minor, and the damage to people was limited to sore muscles and joints. Yes, there’s an economic impact as some workers went days without being able to earn a paycheck, businesses went days without customers even as some were seeing their inventory spoil, and there will be some sort of cost associated with getting the downed debris to a point where the County will collect it and dispose of it. However, that would seem to be a small price to pay to fully display the true character of our island.
My hope in the wake of this event isn’t simply that we know how to be better neighbors to those within our community, but that we now have a better appreciation for the ways that these storms can interrupt and transform our lives. For us, this was essentially an inconvenience, but for our neighbors who lived along the path of the eyewall in Florida, and for our neighbors in the mountains of North and South Carolina, this storm has been devastating. When I spoke with a pastor in Boone, NC earlier this week, he mentioned that not only did they need the basics such as generators, fuel, food, water, and clothing, but they also needed to start securing huge amounts of rock to begin rebuilding roads to re-establish access to people still trapped in their homes. While his situation is tragic, what makes it truly devastating is that I could have spoken with dozens of pastors from dozens of communities and heard a similar story. Being aware of how fortunate we were with this storm, along with the importance of a strong community response, my hope is that our collective hearts will now be open to sharing our blessings and resources with those who are suffering in our neighboring communities.
In the Gospel of Luke, John the Baptist told those around him that if they had two coats, they should share with those who had none. Friends, our neighbors throughout the southeast have none right now, and we have so much more than just two coats. We have loved our immediate neighbors well, but we are exhorted to love our neighbors beyond our immediate communities. Therefore, I am asking you to consider sharing your blessings with others. Organizations such as the South Carolina Baptist Disaster Relief effort (Give As An Individual – South Carolina Baptist Convention (scbaptist.org), Samaritan’s Purse (Samaritan’s Purse Is Responding to Hurricane Helene (samaritanspurse.org), or specific locations such as Perkinsville Church in Boone (Give to Perkinsville Church (pushpay.com) are the boots on the ground, reaching out to provide aid and comfort to neighbors who were not nearly as fortunate as we were. They are bringing hope to those who have no hope, and they need our help. Perhaps the reason that we were spared worse damage was to allow us to bless those who now have nothing.
Ultimately, this entire storm is a reminder that love is not a passive descriptor – it is a compelling force that drives us to acts of selflessness. We responded well when those acts benefitted members of our community, and our island is so much stronger now as a result. In a time where politics seem to have created deep division within our nation, our outpouring of love to our neighbors beyond our island might just be the thing that shows them what love within a community is meant to be.
Peace and blessings – Pastor Aaron