You may know someone who has experienced flooding…..maybe you’ve been through that yourself. I’m not talking about some water in your basement (which can be devastating and very expensive). I’m talking about water running through your living room.
Those are the times when you need a neighbor to come with the experience of knowing what will be valuable to get you back into your home. Midwest Mission Distribution Center (MMDC) in Chatham, IL, (often confused in our circles with Midwest Food Bank) is one of the places where the United Methodist Church collects supplies needed in the event of natural disasters and other emergencies. They don’t wait until the disaster happens to begin collecting….they have to be ready before the floods or tornadoes or hurricanes or wildfires come so that they can immediately send supplies where they are needed when they are needed.
All of the churches in the Illinois Great Rivers Conference (that’s our conference) received an email on Monday that there is an urgent need for cleaning buckets used by those who’ve experienced flooding. In the month of May alone, the MMDC has sent out nearly 4,000 cleaning buckets to flood victims in Illinois and Missouri. They now need to restock so that they have these supplies needed for the next emergency….and sadly, there are always those ‘next’ emergencies.
Rain doesn’t discriminate…...it takes its toll on rich and poor alike. I keep thinking about the song, “The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock”......if you know this song, you know that the rains came down and the floods came up, but the house on the rock stood strong. Well, that’s true in a spiritual sense…...but in this case, flooding has caused damage even to those houses built on a solid foundation.
Fortunately, we can help. We can go to www.midwestmissiondc.org to see details, to get the list of supplies needed in the cleaning/flood buckets, and to learn more about the MMDC. If you’d like to make a financial contribution, you can do that through our Calvary App or put Flood Buckets in your check memo.
Even if you don’t get everything on the list for a cleaning/flood bucket, feel free to bring even one item to the church and we’ll make sure it gets to Chatham. If you’d like to be the driver who delivers these items to Chatham, that’s great, also!
May we continue to be in prayer for people cleaning up after flooding…..this process is a very long and arduous process. May songs of praise and perseverance fill their hearts while cleaning out the muck.
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Tomorrow on the Daily Connection: A Light to My Path
About the Author
Debbie Reese is the Co-Directing Pastor of Calvary UMC