I think we missed our chance
I have spent most of the last 3 days without power. The remnants of Hurricane Ike hit Louisville on Sunday morning and knocked the power out about 1:15 Sunday afternoon. It could have been worse. We had no wind damage, no trees down, just no electricity. 60 of the 120 counties in Kentucky were affected by wind damage and power outages. Over 300,000 homes in the metro Louisville area alone were without power. As I write this Thursday morning over 100,00 still are. LG&E our service provider is doing a yeoman’s job of getting powered restored. Most schools have missed 3 days of classes; other like Jefferson County will be out all week.But I think as churches we missed a fantastic opportunity to "be the church".
Here's what I mean. Sunday night most churches rightfully so cancelled services. But Monday, Monday provided ample opportunity for us to "be the church" in our community. Every community had people with down trees, no power, students out of school and government officials saying not to get out unless you had to. So did Tuesday and Wednesday and Today.
So where were we......Why didn't we mobilize students and adults that were staying home to clear limbs, cut trees, deliver meals and ICE. I heard of only one instance on the news where any church did anything. They opened up their building for people to shower in, And believe me a hot shower would have been welcome. While we had water to shower, there was no power to the water heater. We had a great opportunity to make an impact in our communities, to meet our neighbors and to as my friend Wendy would say "be Jesus with skin."
This is not an attack on disaster relief efforts or teams. They do a fantastic job and I am not sure they were needed here. The need in the gulf is far greater. Dare to Care did a great job of providing food for people who needed it, but why did they have to? Every community affected had a church in it, some more than one church.
We had resources: cooks (some of the best cooking in the world happens at church), students with nothing to do (the internet doesn't work without power), and hours and hours of daylight, with warm days and cool nights. We missed a great opportunity to be light in a dark world. Let’s hope that next time we are better prepared.
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posted by: Joe Ball on September 18th, 2008
