Jeff Gardner says he knows a miracle staring him in the face when he sees one.
He was at a home assessing what kind of cleanup crews were needed in the wake of Hurricane Sally, which hit the Gulf Coast in the early hours of Sept. 16.
The first thing he saw was a tree lying just a few feet from the homeowner’s front door.
“It had missed the corner of the house by about a foot,” Gardner said. “The homeowner, Mrs. Barbara Preston, came out and showed me another large limb that was lying less than an inch from the back wall of her house. It was nothing short of a miracle that it had not hit the roof.”
He asked her the first thing that came to mind — if she was a Christian. And she said yes.
“I told her I knew, because it was obvious she had prayed through the storm,” Gardner said.
New friends
And then he found out something else — their paths had crossed before, and he didn’t know it.
Preston was a member of a local Baptist church, and she had also worked at the Baptist Sunday School Board in Nashville before it became LifeWay Christian Resources. She asked Gardner if he had ever done a Backyard Bible Club, and he said yes.
“It turned out she had helped write the very first Backyard Bible Club material published by the Baptist Sunday School Board,” he said. “She was also a writer for some of the Sunday School materials that my home church had used when I was just a kid.”
For Gardner, his assessment role at Preston’s house suddenly took on new meaning.
“This dear lady’s commitment to Christ and His Church had helped lay a foundation of faith in my life and the lives of thousands of others, and this was Southern Baptists’ chance to bless one who had been a blessing,” he said. “We all dream of those kinds of experiences one day when we get to heaven, but it’s not every day you get to have one here on earth.”
Gardner — pastor of First Baptist Church, St. Elmo — was on his first disaster relief assignment this week, learning on the job right in his own community. In addition to meeting Preston, he helped with assessment at other homes ahead of chain saw crews. Some homes had major damage; others were minor like Preston’s. Sometimes the crews bless believers, and other times they show the love of Christ to nonbelievers. One man came to faith in Jesus during recent ABDR efforts while talking to a member of a tarping team.
In total, disaster relief crews have received around 900 work requests along the Gulf, said Mark Wakefield, the state’s lead strategist for Disaster Relief.
The hurricane was the first to make landfall in Alabama since Hurricane Ivan in 2004.
Wakefield said it’s been a blessing to see volunteers come together to help out from other states and around Alabama. Some of those include college students serving through Alabama Baptist Collegiate Disaster Relief.
Kinley Bell, a junior at the University of South Alabama, said she’s always enjoyed serving people impacted by natural disasters. In 2019, she went on a missions trip with her Baptist Campus Ministries group to help with cleanup after Hurricane Michael in Panama City, Florida. But this one felt different, she said.
Serving at home
“I never expected to be cleaning up after a natural disaster in my college town,” she said. “You pick up debris a little bit differently when you’re in your own community. It was a humbling experience to serve and connect with individuals in my community over a common crisis.”
Broxton Sanders, a junior at USA, said it was a meaningful experience for him.
“When I went to volunteer on Saturday and saw the devastation, my heart hurt for those affected,” he said. “For many, the challenges brought by this storm were too much to bear alone. To be able to help these people bear the challenges together was such an uplifting experience. I saw that it was not I who did the work but Christ through me.”
Gifts to Alabama Baptist Disaster Relief at work
Right now, hurricane relief is a critical part of Alabama Baptists’ outreach, said Mark Wakefield, the state’s lead strategist for Disaster Relief.
And funds earmarked for that effort could go toward a lot of different things.
“It could go for feeding volunteers, or it could go for buying temporary roofing materials, which we are going through pretty quickly,” Wakefield said, noting that they buy those materials in bulk from the manufacturer.
Disaster relief funds also help with buying, renting, maintaining and fueling heavy equipment like skid steers, or helping churches make repairs after a hurricane. Funds also help Alabama Baptist Disaster Relief crews prepare to respond in other states when there’s a need.
None of the funds donated to Alabama Baptist Disaster Relief go to overhead or administrative costs — all go directly to help people in disaster zones. Click here to donate to Hurricane Disaster Relief.
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