When the hurricanes hit this year, I found myself balling reading the news about all of the devastation and stories of people who survived the disasters. I clearly cared about this topic, so why not put my actions where my heart is?
I was able to spend five days in Houston working with a church connection and the organization Send Relief to reach the homeowners that needed help. Accommodations, food, and transportation were covered while in Texas. It only cost me $100 to fly down here. Below are some things I learned while on my first disaster relief deployment.
1. Mold
Who knew it was so toxic? Exposure to regular mold can make you sick with a variety of things including pnemonia and respitory issues. Then there is BLACK MOLD, which is caused by flood waters that are contaminated with sewage, and on top of making you sick, it could kill you. All of the wooden floor boards, drywall, insulation, and any other wood that was soaked in the flood has to be torn out of the house. That brings me to the second thing I learned…how to tear apart and mitigate mold in a house.
2. Relief Efforts
Today, I woke up somewhat dreading but somewhat looking forward to what we were prepared to do… and that was crawl under a house with a headlamp looking for moldy insulation in order to pull it out. You get down and dirty in these homes… some of which had five feet of water in them for thirteen days. My team worked on five houses total, all at different stages. We did work that ranged from sweeping, spraying bleach and shockwave, to using a hammer and crowbar to pull every wooden floorboard out of a house. And that is just the beginning. You haven’t even scratched the surface of what these homeowners are about to face in the process of rebuilding. Simply by volunteering your time (and sweat) you can save a homeowner tens of thousands of dollars and give them the encouragement when they just don’t know where to begin.
We connected very well with the owner, Pam, of the last house we worked on; and she was telling us that she had lived in that house since she was three years old. She could not go inside at first without getting emotional, and hadn’t done anything to start rebuilding in the month that has passed since hurricane Harvey hit (she just didn’t know where to start). The hope and community we brought as volunteers changed that for her.
3. Hope
What do you do when you lose everything? A natural disaster hit that you weren’t planning on. You lose your car to flood damage. You lose your job because you can’t get to work. You lose the roof over your head. Do you lose all hope? That’s not the case for some of these people, and that’s because they find their hope in God. One woman told us that the hurricane was one of the best things God could have put in her life. It reminded her that these worldly things are fleeting and temporary. We care so much about the house we want with the white picket fence that we can loose sight of what really matters — glorifying God and our home in Heaven. This changes your perspective from only thinking about now to an eternal view. When we lack confidence about what happens to us when we die, we become a slave to now. Devastation is much worse when you believe it is all you have.
4. Love
The fact that a few of us traveled all the way from Colorado (and some from California, North Carolina, and other states) just to come wear a face mask and gloves to tear out moldy debris from homes in 90 degree humid Texas amazed people. It brought some to tears. God has a way of using natural disasters to reveal His love in a powerful way. Seeing people affected by these hurricanes makes me want to love on them even more. Would I normally jump into the task of removing deadly black mold if it were at my house? I probably wouldn’t be as excited about it. But when I saw the look on Pams face as she worked to tear up her living room floor next to a wall of black mold, I asked her to step over so I could clean it for her.
These disasters bring people together. But it makes you think, why don’t we help our own neighbors more often? If something speaks to your heart and you have the means to help, please don’t just send your “thoughts and prayers.” Go do something about it. Any way that you can shine a light in the life of someone else means more than they can articulate. We are called to be the hands and feet of Jesus. Let my life be the proof of His love.
“Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, ‘go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?” – James 2:15-16