by Barry Howard

Early this morning, I drove north on Scenic Highway, one of the most beautiful coastal drives in America. And yet, as the sunrise glistened over Escambia Bay, the picturesque Florida scenery was scarred by nature’s whim.  Stately oaks were uprooted, townhomes were blown from their foundation, homes stood minus their roofs and windows, and neighbors were helping neighbors sift through the debris.

The scene is far too familiar to me. In 1994 I was serving at the First Baptist Church of Williams near Jacksonville, Alabama when a tornado touched down on Palm Sunday near Ragland, Alabama and cut a trail to Rome, Georgia, demolishing hundreds of homes, destroying five church campuses, and taking 29 lives before leaving that area.

In 2005, when I began serving at FBC Pensacola, we dealt with a series of destructive storms including Hurricanes Ivan, Cindy, Dennis, and Katrina. Later, we sent teams to assist with repair and rebuilding after tornadoes in Enterprise, Alabama and Sipsey, Alabama.

Now, here in Escambia County, we have once again experienced two destructive storms within the same week. As we help others put life back together, let us employ the lessons learned from storms past as we help our neighbors rebuild after the storm.

Once a storm passes, residents are faced with a haunting reality. Life will never be the same.  For many, friends have been injured, homes have been destroyed, and irreplaceable family heirlooms lost. A sense of despair prevails.  But for most, at least, life will continue. In fact, this week’s storm cut an 8 mile path damaging over 300 homes, yet there were no fatalities and only minimal injuries.

Following the Palm Sunday tornado and the coastal hurricanes, the communities I served learned a lot about patience and perseverance. We learned a lot about grace and hope. We learned the importance of looking forward and not backward.  We learned that our dreams trumped our nightmares. We learned a lot about faith and life.

At least seven crucial lessons learned from storms past have helped us to heal and move forward, slowly and progressively:

1. Life goes on after the storm. Once the initial shock of the devastation has been absorbed, it’s time to channel all of your energy to re-building and moving forward. Despite the grief over things lost, there is a unique kind of joy that arises when you begin dreaming of the new things you can build…together. And interestingly, the challenge of re-building had a healing effect and can be a healthy way to process the grief of storm-associated losses.

2. When a storm hits, no one is exempt. Storms result from a chaotic weather pattern and they tend to strike indiscriminately. Contrary to religious superstition, storms are not typically God’s way of punishing the most wicked of sinners. Storms affect everyone in their path, whether you are rich or poor, young or old, faithful or faithless. As Grady Nutt used to remind us, “It rains on the just and the unjust, and not always just on the ‘just’.”

3. When the going gets tough, people of faith mobilize and work together cooperatively. After each of the aforementioned storms, a variety of churches and missional partners organized, rolled up their sleeves, and went to work. Volunteers from faith-based groups often organize quickly and dispatch to the scene, while professional and government groups are often slowed by paperwork and red tape restrictions. I distinctly remember many of the professional workers who partnered with us telling me how they admired the work ethic, the productivity, and the cooperative spirit of the volunteer teams from churches and faith-based organizations.

4. All kinds of talents and skill levels are needed for clean-up and re-building. We were fortunate to have a huge corps of skilled personnel who managed chain saws, dozers, cranes, and front-end loaders. However, we also needed folks to cook food, drive trucks, pick up debris, run errands, care for children, visit the elderly, sweep the floor, manage communications, and do household cleaning. In disaster relief, every job is important and every volunteer has something to offer. Never underestimate the importance of doing all the good you can, where you can, when you can.

If you want to volunteer, always connect with a group such as the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, BRACE, or a church group. Don’t just strike out on your own. Our staff is currently exploring the best ways for us to connect in Century and Pensacola.

5. Relief work builds community. We learned that remarkable bonding occurs in the field. The sense of community born among those who work together following a storm forges a spiritual kinship that lasts for a lifetime… or longer.

6. You are wise not to live in fear of the next storm. Those affected by storms may be inclined to experience storm phobia, a fear of storms. Many begin to live in such a heightened state of anxiety, that every cloud invokes a near panic attack.  One alternative to living in fear is to be better prepared for the next storm. Perhaps that means creating a storm preparation checklist.  Or possibly that means better implementation of a storm safety plan.  Time and energy spent worrying about something as unpredictable as a future storm is wasted energy. It is best to find creative ways to transform that energy into constructive preparation.

7. The process of going through a storm can deepen your spiritual faith. For some, simply the experience of having a “close call” with death provokes a profound sense of one’s mortality. For others, there is a sense of a “new lease on life,” that translates into a commitment to live in a deeper and more meaningful sort of way. For still others, during the rebuilding process they discover a community of friends who inspire them toward a more authentic and honest understanding of faith, a faith they want and often claim for themselves.

This week many of us have grieved with and prayed for friends and neighbors after storms have wreaked havoc in local neighborhoods. I am sure the local residents are feeling shock, anger, and a nearly overwhelming sense of despair.

But the people of Escambia County are resilient. In the next few days, relief agencies and churches will mobilize labor pools and resource centers.  And residents will be drying their tears, rolling up their sleeves, and getting ready to repair and rebuild, because there are some things deep inside that the strongest storm cannot destroy.

(Barry Howard serves as the Senior Minister at the First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida.)

by Barry Howard

Election years can be volatile, unpredictable, and filled with heated political rhetoric. And these days, it is not unusual for prominent pastors and local clergy to join the fray of bombastic oratory. While I do not think pastors should be silent, I do think a pastor’s tone and message should be helpful, encouraging, and non-partisan.

Especially during election years, pastors are faced with the dilemma of how to address political issues fairly, legally, and biblically from the pulpit. While some on both the left and the right attempt to hijack the pulpit in order to support their cause or their favored candidate, many of us in ministry strive to encourage members to participate in the political process but we refuse to endorse any specific candidate.

This year marks the ninth presidential election since I began serving as a pastor. Additionally, during my ministerial tenure, I have observed numerous local elections and dozens of referendums. Early in my ministry, thanks to wise mentors, I committed to a strategy for dealing pastorally with political issues from the pulpit.

This strategy is based on four objectives: 1) To maintain a non-partisan pulpit. 2) To protect the separation of church and state. 3) To respect the diverse political convictions within the congregation. 4) To highlight the biblical texts concerning respect for our government and our governmental leaders.

When I hear accounts of ministers who publicly endorse candidates from the pulpit, of churches who provide biased or partisan voters’ guides and of churches who have invited political candidates or their spokespersons to speak in Sunday worship services, I am troubled. From a historical Baptist perspective, for a pastor to engage in partisan politics would be considered an abuse of pastoral privilege and a violation of a pastor’s civil and spiritual responsibility. Historically, when the church and state become intertwined, the church doesn’t fare well.

If blatant partisan political activism in the pulpit is inappropriate, what is an appropriate and proactive strategy for addressing election-related issues from the pulpit without violating the wall of separation? Here are four things that a pastor can do to encourage good citizenship:

1. Encourage members to vote. Words like these have frequented my sermons as election time nears: “We are blessed to live in a country that values political and religious freedom, and you have both the opportunity and responsibility to participate in the electoral process as you vote your convictions.” I have never suggested to a church member, either explicitly or implicitly, for whom they should vote, only that they should vote. In fact, I have never revealed to a congregation the name of the candidate I intend to vote for. (Actually, I seldom tell my wife which candidate I plan to vote for.)

2. Challenge church members to pray for candidates and for those elected to leadership. I believe that persons of faith should pray for their political leaders, whether they approve of a leader’s performance or not. Additionally, I also encourage church members to pray for candidates seeking office. Choosing to seek public office requires tremendous sacrifice and takes its toll on a candidate’s entire family whether they win or lose. The average citizen cannot fathom the wear and tear of the political process for all candidates, no matter their political party.

3. Encourage members to participate in the political process. Challenge members to listen carefully to the candidates, to engage in civil dialogue about the important issues, and to consider campaigning for their preferred candidate. When considering which candidate to support, it is fair to evaluate the competency, character, and ideological convictions of the candidate. However, I strive to remind others that name-calling, broad-brushing, and dishonesty, though prevalent at times, do not enhance the political process.

4. Finally, I invite church members to consider running for public office. Just as I invite members to consider a vocation ministry, mission service or a host of other careers, I also invite members to consider political service as a part of their spiritual calling. I have been privileged to serve as pastor to candidates on the local, state and national level, many of whom were elected and enjoyed multiple terms of effective service. Although an individual should never enter the political arena naively, many individuals find political office to be a significant avenue of service for the common good of society.

Although the Bible instructs believers to “render unto Caesar,” the Bible does not seem to anticipate a democratic process wherein citizens participate in choosing “Caesar.” Therefore, there is not a specific “how to behave during an election year” passage in scripture. However, many of the texts that equip us for life, verses such as “let all things be done decently and in order” (I Corinthians 14:40), “pray for your leaders” (I Timothy 2:2), and “do not slander one another” (James 4:11), are especially relevant and applicable for an election year.

The pulpit is a place to accent the privilege and responsibility of choosing our leaders, not a place to dictate the decision.

(Barry Howard serves as the Senior Minister at the First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida.)