By the mercy and grace of God, we are still here today.”
On April 29, that was the praise that went up from Marlin Cox, pastor of Greensport Baptist Church in St. Clair County’s Shoal Creek Valley area near Ashville and Ragland.
It was that area where a reported 11 people lost their lives in tornadoes that struck the evening of April 27. Two other fatalities occurred in St. Clair County during the first wave of storms that hit early that morning, according to news reports.
Three of the 11 people who died in Shoal Creek Valley had ties to Greensport Baptist, Cox said.
During the storm, Cox and his wife, Jamie, were sheltered in a Shoal Creek home with a group of other people. Though all in that home were safe, the roof came off the structure.
“God was with us,” Cox said April 29 in recounting what happened.
His church is one of two St. Clair Baptist Association churches located along St. Clair County Road 22 in Shoal Creek Valley where the destruction was centered. The other is Bethany Baptist Church, Ashville. Both churches sustained significant damage.
Greensport’s seven-year-old fellowship hall is caved in the front and the roof is missing. The drop-off area that used to grace the front of the building is now behind the church. There is also damage to the sanctuary, including the fact that the steeple no longer sits upon it.
The situation at Bethany is comparable. There, huge trees fell onto the sanctuary and educational building. “It looks extensive to me,” Jimmy Hopkins, Bethany’s pastor, said of the damage.
Hopkins’ praise was that “all of [the church members] have survived. We had some close calls. But God has been good to us.”
Some areas of Shoal Creek Valley are “totally ravaged,” said Ben Chandler, director of missions for St. Clair Association.
“This is the closest to [Hurricane] Katrina that I’ve seen in a tornado,” Chandler added.
Indeed, when Rick Lance, executive director of the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions (SBOM), and The Alabama Baptist visited the area April 29, devastation is what was found.
Home after home had been reduced to rubble.
Power poles were down or missing completely. Tall trees that once were part of extensive forestation now are only mangled, limbless, leafless sticks jutting up from the ground.
Ron Warren — member of First Baptist Church, Ashville, and state coordinator for cleanup and recovery for disaster relief with SBOM — was among the volunteers who worked through the night Wednesday and into Thursday morning in Shoal Creek Valley to clear a path through debris so that emergency personnel could reach storm victims.
Warren said volunteers cut many, many trees — some which were massive — for what seemed like miles in order to get to trapped and injured victims.
One right after the other, the large trees lay across the road. “It was odd to see that many trees,” Warren said. “… I’ve seen worse. But I’ve never seen that many trees lapped over on the road.”
The volunteers began around 9 p.m. Wednesday to clear a path for rescuers. Each chainsaw operator had to be accompanied by another volunteer who held a flashlight so that the cutter could see what to do. It took approximately three hours of cutting through downed trees to reach the first of the victims.
“Somewhere around 3:30 [Thursday morning], we got to the last people in that area,” Warren said.
Edwin Talley — pastor of First Baptist Church, Ragland, and a member of the St. Clair Association disaster relief team — was also among the first to see the devastation Wednesday night. He and his wife, Teresa, helped to transport medics into Shoal Creek Valley and to evacuate the injured out of the area to a triage set up at Ashville High School.
Talley explained that the way was so treacherous Wednesday night that some victims had to be transported in stages, first on four-wheelers, then in trucks before reaching emergency vehicles.
Glenn Pender — pastor of Happy Home Baptist Church, Leeds, and coordinator for St. Clair Association’s disaster relief, said the enormity of the storm and the need for relief is “overwhelming.”
On Thursday, Pender and 20 other volunteers with the association’s disaster relief team worked to help residents in the Moody area of the county, which had been hit by the first wave of storms early Wednesday morning. Another 28 volunteers from Southern Baptist churches came to assist, as did disaster relief workers from Shelby Baptist Association and Blount County’s Friendship Baptist Association.
The St. Clair Association’s relief team set up its command post Thursday at First Baptist Church, Moody, which had suffered damage early Wednesday.
At First, Moody, the steeple that used to be atop the front of the sanctuary, now lies on its side in a back parking lot where the storm placed it. Also, the church sanctuary is missing some of its roof. No awnings are left in place. In addition, the support posts on the church’s porches have either shifted or are down completely.
Nonetheless, Brad Moseley, the church’s pastor, downplayed it. “The damage to the church is just superficial. My heart goes out to the people of the community who are devastated. We just want to do what we can for them.”
It is a sentiment that Cox echoed about Shoal Creek Valley. “I really haven’t paid a whole lot of attention to the church [damage] because there are so many people hurting in this community.”
On Friday, the St. Clair Association’s command post was relocated to Bethany Baptist, Shoal Creek Valley. Chandler said the relief effort would continue in the area “for the long haul.”
Early Friday morning, disaster relief crews from Cleburne Baptist Association and from Hill Crest Baptist Church, Anniston, in Calhoun Baptist Association were working to remove the trees that had fallen onto Bethany Baptist.
Pender said there is also relief assistance needed in Ragland, Pell City, Riverside and Odenville.
While disaster relief meets an immediate need for storm victims, it is about more than just cleaning up the area, Pender said. Team members are there to share the hope of Jesus with the people.
Although the storms brought much sadness upon Shoal Creek Valley and the people of the area need the fervent prayers of believers, Hopkins encourages Christians to remember in prayer everyone in the state who was affected.
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