Our Covington site spent several days preparing for Hurricane Sally to make a direct hit in Southeast Louisiana, only to find that the storm turned east instead and dropped about 2.5 feet of rain in Pensacola, Florida. By the time the storm cleared the area many trees and branches had come down and most of the area was without power.

ReachGlobal Crisis Response reached out to Grace Community Church in Pensacola to offer our assistance because part of our mission is to serve EFCA churches in times of crisis. They were grateful for our help as they had several pecan trees come down on the church property, one of which had broken their main water line. The first weekend after the storm Trinity Church, our partner in Covington, sent several volunteers with a group of our staff to help Grace Community with their church clean up day. Our staff brought several more chainsaws and our skid loader along to make quick work of dragging logs away.

By the end of the day all the downed pecan trees were removed from the church grounds. One of the ladies looked around and said, "We sure are glad you all came to help. It would been weeks if we had to do all this on our own." With the extra help and extra chainsaws available Grace Community was even able to send some volunteers out to help at church members' homes, and offer help to some elderly neighbors that same day. Hopefully now that the church building is close to being restored, they will have more opportunities for local outreach. Our ministry is excited to be able to serve our EFCA churches, and also expand their capacity to share the love of Christ.

Please pray for Grace Community Church and the community in Pensacola as they continue clean up efforts. Pray that God will use the church to share his love through this crisis, and that the church members would be sensitive to promptings from the Holy Spirit.