Folks Blasted Out of Their Homes
Land in Our Church House
(this poem was inspired by evacuation shelter )
Like wind-blown leaves from the storms fury,
so these folk blasted out of their homes by Hurricane Ike
have landed in our church house.
We accepted them as God's children -- tired, shocked, even bewildered children.
Hungry they came -- too long without a change of shoes, socks, underwear
-- too long without a shower.
At our table they ate, in our showers they bathed. We found clothes for their bodies, shoes for their feet.
In the sanctuary the Good Book says,
"The righteous will ask him, 'Lord, when did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothed you? When did we see you sick or in prison, and go to visit you?
Then, the King will reply, "whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did it for me."
------------------------------------------------ a personal comment-----------------
I never imagined hosting hurricane evacuees. We got ready for Hurricane Gustav, but no evacuees came to our area. Then elderly and ill evacuees came out of Corpus Christi arrived having left in anticipation of Hurricane Ike's landfall. But Ike turned and hit with a fury Galveston and the upper Texas coast. Out of the storm surge came the second wave of evacuees. These escaped or survived with only the clothes on their back, and with no change of clothes.
We all know that these disasters happen, usually in far away places. We watch the reports on CNN at an emotional distance. But when Ike hit close and evacuees came into our church, I was deeply moved. I wrote this prose poem soon afterwards. I had read the Scripture many times before, but in service in our evacuation shelter I found myself with other members and friends living out the very words of this moving Scripture.
Grace and peace,
Bruce Williamson
Land in Our Church House
(this poem was inspired by evacuation shelter )
Like wind-blown leaves from the storms fury,
so these folk blasted out of their homes by Hurricane Ike
have landed in our church house.
We accepted them as God's children -- tired, shocked, even bewildered children.
Hungry they came -- too long without a change of shoes, socks, underwear
-- too long without a shower.
At our table they ate, in our showers they bathed. We found clothes for their bodies, shoes for their feet.
In the sanctuary the Good Book says,
"The righteous will ask him, 'Lord, when did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothed you? When did we see you sick or in prison, and go to visit you?
Then, the King will reply, "whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did it for me."
------------------------------------------------ a personal comment-----------------
I never imagined hosting hurricane evacuees. We got ready for Hurricane Gustav, but no evacuees came to our area. Then elderly and ill evacuees came out of Corpus Christi arrived having left in anticipation of Hurricane Ike's landfall. But Ike turned and hit with a fury Galveston and the upper Texas coast. Out of the storm surge came the second wave of evacuees. These escaped or survived with only the clothes on their back, and with no change of clothes.
We all know that these disasters happen, usually in far away places. We watch the reports on CNN at an emotional distance. But when Ike hit close and evacuees came into our church, I was deeply moved. I wrote this prose poem soon afterwards. I had read the Scripture many times before, but in service in our evacuation shelter I found myself with other members and friends living out the very words of this moving Scripture.
Grace and peace,
Bruce Williamson
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Bruce Williamson