Each day we worked I found myself faced with new emotions, new frustrations, and new concepts about why we were there. Our purpose is to serve those in need and bring God's love to them. This I have heard at least a dozen times in one fashion or another. But what I struggled with personally on this trip was how to decide who is in need? There were so many homes destroyed, families torn apart and lives affected, how do we know who needs help and more importantly who needs us to provide them with that help?
Some houses we went to were nothing more than a pile of rubble, while others were still standing with trees and rubble down in the yard. There was such a stark difference in each of the houses. And it was hard not to judge. We live in a society that wants to help those who appear to need it the most. Where we are expected to help only those who really need it. And there were times when I questioned who really needed it. But who was I to judge where God needed me to be? If he sent me to a house, I assume it was for a reason. So I tried to take time to find those reasons.
There was one house we worked where I was frustrated. All we did was move trees to the road. This was absurd. There were houses and churches still in piles that we could be working on, that we could be helping. This man just had a few trees down. The comparisons seemed unbalanced. I said a prayer going home that day asking God if that was really where we needed to be. I got my answer the next morning when we returned to the same house. Okay God, clearly you know what you are doing.
Why am I here? I had a chance to chat with the homeowner a little and found out how much he really did need our help. Not just in moving the trees in his yard and clearing it to make it safer. But he also needed someone to listen to his story. While in Alabama I heard tornado story after tornado story. Each just has heartbreaking as the next. Everyone wanted to share their story. But this man's story wasn't about the tornado. It was about his life. And as I sat there listening, I could tell that just us being there meant more to him than anything. We could have not done a single thing to his property and I still got the feeling he would have enjoyed just having us there.
It was then that I realized that our going to Alabama was not about how much work we could do in a week or how many homes we could clean up. It was about the lives we touched while we were down there. It was about showing the people of Fort Payne and Rainsville that they were not alone in this. It was about reminding people that God still cared, and that he always had.
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