Linking with somuchshoutingsomuchlaughter.blogspot.com tomorrow on the topic, “the broken, beautiful church…”
Perhaps it might be good to tell you that I was, at that time, the Associate Pastor for a congregation of about 350, worshipping in a beautiful new worship center directly in the line of the flames on the side of a Santa Barbara CA foothill. Our senior pastor had flown that morning to the east coast, where he would officiate at the memorial service for his wife’s mother and that meant that the major burden for decision making fell on the office staff and on me. And I was now a dozen miles away. We kept in touch by email through the night – until power outages made that difficult. We made phone calls, sent text messages, watched the news in stupefied horror as the flames raced through entire neighborhoods – neighborhoods where people we knew and loved had homes and memories and precious possessions.
The next day, we held an emergency staff meeting in the home of our bookkeeper, who lived in a non-evacuation area. A few key lay leaders also joined us, as we prayed and planned and brainstormed. “How can we gather?” we wondered. “Worship is at the center of who we are as God’s people on Cold Spring Road. And Loving One Another is our second greatest mandate – how can we do that well in the midst of crisis and loss?”
Within 24 hours of our hastily put-together worship gathering, we were back into our church facilities – graciously spared any serious damage. My husband and I moved back into our home, no damage there either. And over the next few weeks, I watched in amazement and grateful awe as people cared for one another with grace and wisdom.
