Hurricane Florence

Hurricane Florence is approaching southeastern North Carolina and projects to drop between 9 and 30 inches of rain on North  Carolina and South Carolina.

The Weather Channel uses the word “catastrophic” when referring to the potential and probable effect it will have on the area. Massive evacuations have been taking place with interstates turned one-way inland.

We lived in North Carolina for seven years and we are concerned about those precious people that welcomed us like family in 1983. We also vacation at what appears, today, to be ground zero for landfall of the force of wind, rain and storm surge.

We worry about those who live on the island of Holden Beach, Ocean Isle and Oak Island and others. We are concerned about Boomers beach rentals who years ago gave Chad a used tri-wheeled bike to take home so he would have a bike to ride.

We worry about the little ecumenical chapel where we worshipped on Sunday. They let a different preacher in the pulpit each Sunday and then give them a free place to stay for the week.

We worry about our friends John and Margaret Causey who have a home just off the Intercostal Waterway. John is the pastor of the Shallotte Presbyterian Church and has a beach service at Ocean Isle which attracts 700-900 people a Sunday. John and I met in our first pastorates in Wendell and worked together to raise money to feed the hungry through Church World Service’s CROP walk.

We worry about the service workers who clean the homes, wait tables, repair air conditioners, mow the grass, set up cabanas each day, collect the garbage and who probably do not have the money to leave and pay to stay at a motel in Raleigh or points west.

We worry about all the nursing home residents and hospital patients who must be moved to different facilities and those who will probably die from the stress of the move.

We worry about the fabric of communities which may be torn apart, for businesses which will be unable to re-open, for attractions which will be completely destroyed and the jobs which will be lost permanently.

We worry about pollution and the hog waste ponds which could overflow or collapse and dump millions of gallons of hog waste into rivers and streams.

We worry about damage to schools, the electric grid, water systems, airports and more.

I worry about small communities upstream off the Cape Fear River. When storm surge comes in, the river flow will be  pushed back inland. This results in the streams, marshes and swamps having nowhere to drain and the flooding may be unimaginable.

I solicit your prayers for this impending disaster and all the people effected by it.

Moving to the deeper places,
Jeff