Oct. 9 — Update from Oklahoma Disaster Relief Director Jason Yarbrough
Oklahoma Baptist Disaster Relief (DR) teams have been hard at work the past month helping with hurricane recovery. Their work began mid-September after Hurricane Francine caused massive damage in Louisiana.
After setting up a site at Morgan City, La., First, DR immediately began work serving storm victims in numerous ways, including clearing mud and debris, preparing meals, offering showers, providing laundry service and more. Jason Yarbrough, Oklahoma Baptists’ disaster relief director, highlighted the relief work happening and, even more importantly, the ministry conversations that are happening.
Additional teams joined Oklahoma in the response. These included a team from the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention (SBTC), a Texas on Mission (TXM) team and a team from New Mexico. Their combined efforts allowed them to tackle numerous work orders in an effective manner.
In total, the Oklahoma DR teams completed nearly 410 workorders. These teams included assessor/chaplain teams, feeding teams, chainsaw teams and first response teams. For the volunteers, approximately 25,000 meals were made, 300 loads of laundry were done and 750 showers were provided.
While physical needs were being met, teams also worked hard to meet the spiritual needs of the storm victims. There have been 65 gospel conversations, eight professions of faith, 800 contacts made and 30 Bibles distributed.
“As always, our DR Teams are working hard and doing a great job of being the hands and feet of Jesus,” said Yarbrough.
On the weekend of Sept. 27, Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida. Georgia, Tennessee, the Carolinas and the Virginias suffered major damage from trees, mass flooding and the hurricane surge. The resulting impact called for immediate need of relief.
“When Hurricane Helene hit, it was catastrophic,” said Yarbrough. “They’re comparing this to Katrina that hit Louisiana. This is going to be a long-term response and widespread.”
On Monday, Oct. 7, DR teams arrived in North Carolina to help run and operate a recovery site in the Black Mountain area and plan to remain there for a number of weeks according to Yarbrough. Teams also arrived in Georgia to help in recovery efforts there. Some of the resources used in Morgan City, La. were transported to help with response while the rest were sent back to Oklahoma.
“Our volunteers will do the management, feeding, shower and laundry as well as coordinate the distribution center of donated items for the residents of that area,” said Yarbrough.
Numerous other Southern Baptist DR teams have already been working in response to Helene. These teams come from Alabama, Arkansas, Missouri, New Mexico, SBTC, TXM, Kentucky, Mississippi and Ohio. Cooperation from all Southern Baptist DR teams is necessary to complete the thousands of workorders spanning multiple states.
Yarbrough is thankful to those who have been supporting DR through prayer and requests for those prayers to continue as DR continues to serve those effected by recent hurricanes.
“The prayers that we receive give us strength to know that we can handle this,” he said. “Oklahomans have been busy this year. Pray that they’re rested, ready and able to go meet the needs because it’s vast.”
For more information, or to make a tax-deductible donation to Oklahoma Baptist DR, visit www.okdisasterhelp.org.
