As I sit down to write the October note, portions of the Southeast are trying to pick up the pieces after Hurricane Helene while some (and some of these are the very same people!) are preparing for the arrival of Hurricane Milton. If ever there were a time for communities to come together and help (and many have), this is it! However, there are those who seemingly cannot help themselves that are trying to turn this personal tragedy on a catastrophic scale into political fodder. There are many things we can do to help. Adding fuel to the flame by sharing unverified or intentionally inflammatory posts or news does not help put food in bellies, shelter over heads, and clothing on backs. We cannot stop others from taking this opportunity to tear one another down. We can however, choose not to participate in it.
Disaster response is not an exact science. It never goes exactly according to plan. Especially when you are dealing with something on the scale of the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and the difficulty of the terrain of Western North Carolina. Recovery is going to take a long time, and what the affected areas need most will change as the situation develops. People are going to get frustrated. There are going to be times where we feel like we should be doing more. We should resist the temptation to “do something” just to make ourselves feel better. Those in need as well as those on the front lines will let us know how we can help them best. When they let us know, then we help. In the meantime, we sit patiently and pray. In our scramble to help without direction, we can often times make things unintentionally worse rather than helping the situation.
So, what do we do? How do we respond? How do we keep from feeling helpless? As United Methodists, we listen to Jesus, and we turn to our General Rules. Jesus is clear. The two most important things we can do in our lives is love God and love neighbor (Mark 12:28-31). While these instructions sound simple enough, John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movement, recognized it was a lot easier to say we love God and our neighbors than to actually live that out. In order to help us, John gave us the General Rules which are still a part the United Methodist governing documents (The Book of Discipline for the United Methodists reading this.) We show love of God and neighbor by committing ourselves to doing no harm, to doing good, and to staying in love with God (those who are sticklers for accuracy forgive the modernization of the wording of the third rule.)
Doing no harm means we are not going to engage in the political back and forth over the disaster response. We are not going to share posts that are intentionally inflammatory and do not assist in getting aid to the people who need it. We are not going to share unverified information or pictures as AI is making it harder and harder to separate fact from fiction. How can we show love of one neighbor if we are spending our time tearing down another neighbor?
Doing good means we are going to provide aid to those who need it when they ask for it and not before. Right now, the two quickest ways we can help are ones I have already mentioned. We can support UMCOR in their efforts, and we can schedule a time to donate blood at the American Red Cross. The South Carolina Conference is also maintaining a disaster response page on our website that provides other ways to help along with helpful links to aid services for those living in the affected areas. Another beautiful thing about The United Methodist Church is our connection. Many of us have friends and relatives either living in or serving the affected areas. Let’s ask them what they need, and then figure out a way to get it to them. Do we have a spare bedroom and know someone who is needing a place to get out of the way of Milton? What’s stopping us from inviting them to spend a few days with us?
Staying in love with God was originally worded as “attending upon all the ordinances of God” (BOD ¶104). To our 21st Century ears, this can sound very legalistic which is not what was intended here. John Wesley was reminding us to be attentive to our relationship with God. The two primary ways he advised Methodists to do this were through acts of piety and acts of service. Acts of service we covered for a large part in doing good. Acts of piety is taking time to nurture our relationship with and understanding of God through worship, sacrament, and study of scripture. While this last General Rule may not seem important to our disaster response, it is the neglect of this last rule that causes us to mess up following the first two.
There is a lot to do now, and there will be a lot to do in the near and distant future as we work for the restoration of lives and communities. Sometimes the work (or the seemingly lack thereof) is going to be frustrating to us. Let us commit ourselves to not joining the fray of tearing one another down. Let us commit ourselves to building one another up, and let the words of Father Peter Scholtes’ hymn remind us what following Christ with our lives is all about:
We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord;
We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord;
And we pray that all unity will one day be restored.
Chorus: And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love,
yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.
We will walk with each other, we will walk hand in hand;
We will walk with each other, we will walk hand in hand;
And together we’ll spread the news that God is in our land.
We Will work with each other, we will work side by side;
We will work with each other, we will work side by side;
And we’ll guard each person’s dignity and save each person’s pride.
All praise to the Father, from whom all things come;
And all praise to Christ Jesus, His only Son.
And all praise to the Spirit who makes us one.
Grace & Peace,
Pastor Bryan