The Christian Chronicle (Oklahoma City, Okla.), Vol. 75, No. 11, Ed. 1 Thursday, November 1, 2018 Page: 6 of 35
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ACROSS THE NATION
6 THE CHRISTIAN CHRONICLE
NOVEMBER 2018
Christians thankful for near-misses after Michael
BY HAMIL R. HARRIS | THE CHRISTIAN CHRONICLE
Floods from Hurricane Florence devastate North Carolina church ... again
BYCHELLIE ISON | THE CHRISTIAN CHRONICLE
JONATHAN McCRAY
Stains on the communion table of the
South Lumberton Church of Christ show
the level of flooding from Florence.
FIND LINKS to contribute to hurricane relief a
christianchronicle.org.
the Olive Manor church, lives near
the Gulf Coast in Lillian, Ala. He
said he planned to contribute to a
food and supply drive for hurricane
victims organized by the nearby Bay
Minette Church of Christ.
“We are supposed to be the
church,” Whitehurst said, so “we
ought to act like the church and help
our brothers and sisters.”
Lena Morgan, a registered nurse
at the state mental hospital in
Two floods in two years — it’s
something the South Lumberton
Church of Christ in North Carolina
never could have expected.
“We’ve had hurricanes before ...,
but none like these last two that
hit the area,” said Billy Campbell,
minister for the South Lumberton
Church of Christ. He has lived in the
area since 1966.
First, Hurricane Matthew dealt the
region a blow in 2016. Then came
Hurricane Florence.
Weeks after Florence began
its devastating path across the
Carolinas, many there are dealing
with the aftermath.
“We’ve lost flooring and the pews,
and in one area, we’ve got a lot of
sheetrock and insulation that has to
be torn out,” Campbell, said.
The South Lumberton church’s
building was flooded by Florence.
The water line is two feet off the
ground. It’s the second time in two
years the congregation has dealt
with flooding from a hurricane.
In 2016, Hurricane Matthew
brought flooding up to 32 inches
inside the church’s building. It
took months, but in June 2017, the
congregation was able to move back
in. And now, they’ve been hit again.
It took Campbell nine days to get
back into the area after evacuating.
“When I got there, there was
still water in the building,” he said.
“You had to have boots to get in the
building.”
Now that the water has receded, the
congregation is once again tearing
out flooring, throwing out doors and
drying out walls and pews, in the
hope that mold won’t begin to grow.
Fortunately, Campbell’s home was
spared flooding. He said water came
up pretty high in the yard, threatening
the home, but never getting inside.
“They don’t have a place to meet
right now,” Brad Rowley, an elder
at the East Main Church of Christ
in Murfreesboro, Tenn., told The
Christian Chronicle.
Rowley and groups with Disaster
Neither his home nor his church
had electricity, but Jim Beasley was
keeping the faith.
“Colossians 3 tells us to set our
minds on things above and not on
earthly things, and we are going
to be all right,” said
Beasley, minister for
the Meridian Woods
Church of Christ in
Tallahassee, Fla., after
Hurricane Michael
swept into Florida
from the Gulf of
Mexico. It was the
most intense storm on
the big disaster groups don’t go.”
The organization set up a relieef
center at the building of the
Helen Street Church of Christ in
Fayetteville, sending trucks full
of supplies to surrounding areas
to help feed and provide for other
needs of residents.
Churches of Christ Disaster
Response Team is also working
in North Carolina. Volunteers
are cutting up downed trees and
clearing debris from homes and
roadways in the Wilmington area.
As for the South Lumberton congre-
gation, they don’t have flood insur-
ance. The congregation of about 65
members isn’t sure how they 11 pay for
the repairs from this latest disaster.
“It’s just devastating, you know, but
God will provide,” Campbell said.
Several churches are figuring out
how they may be able to provide
financial assistance to the South
Lumberton church.
Chattahoochee Fla., had to spend
two nights at work before she could
get back to her home in Marianna.
“To God be the glory,” Morgan
said after she finally was able to
survey her home. “The trees fell all
around my house, but they didn’t
fall on my house.”
Jesse Jackson, a member of the
Meridian Woods church, felt the
same way. He works as superin-
tendent of Lake Wales Charter
Schools in central Florida and drives
about five hours every weekend to
Tallahassee to see his wife, Sandy,
who is a city attorney.
After the storm, he got home as
soon as he could and found his wife
and his home safe. The storm pulled
a large tree in his yard up by its roots,
but it fell away from the house.
As he began clearing away debris,
“one of the kids came up from
the neighborhood and started to
clear branches,” he said, “and my
neighbor came with his chainsaw
and his truck and started cutting
logs and hauling branches away.”
power, but we are going to be OK.”
Beasley said he didn’t know when
power would be restored to the
church’s building.
But the loss of electricity is only
an inconvenience, the minister
said. Things could have been much
worse. And in other parts of the
Panhandle, they were.
In Panama City, patients at the Bay
Medical Sacred Heart Hospital had
to ride out the storm, but about 100
were transferred 100 miles west to a
hospital in Pensacola.
The hurricane bypassed Pensacola.
That’s a blessing for people including
Gene McCorvey, a member of the
Olive Manor Church of Christ
“I feel blessed, but I want every-
body to be safe,” McCorvey said.
“People have lost their homes, and
they don’t have phone service.
My heart goes out to the people
because, as Pensacola residents, we
have been through hurricanes, and
during Hurricane Ivan, we didn’t
have electricity for two weeks.”
Melvin Whitehurst, minister for
f J
NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION
See christianchronide.org for
updates on Hurricane Michael.
Beasley
record to hit the Florida Panhandle.
The day after the Category 4
storm passed, Beasley was at the
store, buying an electric generator
for $400.
“We have a phone tree, and we
were able to call all of our members.
Everyone is okay,” Beasley told The
Christian Chronicle. “We have a lot
of trees down, and people have lost
Assistance CoC have been working
to help the South Lumberton
congregation.
‘We’re trying to cover a 50- to
60-mile radius of Fayetteville (N.C.),”
said Mike Baumgartner with Disaster
Assistance CoC. ‘We’re getting where
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Tryggestad, Erik. The Christian Chronicle (Oklahoma City, Okla.), Vol. 75, No. 11, Ed. 1 Thursday, November 1, 2018, newspaper, November 1, 2018; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1509395/m1/6/?q=%22~1%22~1: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Abilene Christian University Library.