Preparing a way forward in the wake of disaster

LOUISVILLE — Secure in a nearly century-old home built on a stone foundation in the shelter of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Rev. Lynn Bledsoe never had any reason to fear.

Until the mountains literally trembled.

Soon after Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida last September, the catastrophic storm blazed a path of destruction through the southeastern United States and Southern Appalachian Mountains.

In North Carolina — one of several states devastated by what would later be classified as the deadliest hurricane in the contiguous U.S. since Hurricane Katrina in 2005 — the mountains were the hardest hit.

“Even though in the psalmist’s day, the hills were a dangerous place,” said Bledsoe, who lives with her husband, Bill Ryan, in Fairview, North Carolina, and serves in retirement as a pastoral visitor for Montreat Presbyterian Church, “I’ve just never felt threatened by our ancient mountains. I’ve always felt safe here.”

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But Bledsoe’s peaceful world was rocked in an instant when the hurricane swept away not only her long-held sense of security but also the very ground beneath her feet.

“When it all started to happen, initially we just thought it was going to rain a lot,” she said. “We knew that our road — a dirt road — was out the night before Helene hit, but since we had a generator, we weren’t worried. Then my husband looked out, and the terrace right in front of our house had collapsed. There was a 15-foot drop-off outside of our front door. I was afraid that we would have to tear down the house.”

As the terrifying storm’s destruction continued to escalate, Bledsoe and her husband watched in horror as a mudslide came from beneath their home, driving a rock “the size of a Volkswagen” into their front yard and the garden she had worked on all summer, where it still sits today.

“When I told my husband that the hymn that kept singing in me after the storm was ‘On Christ the Solid Rock I Stand,’ he said, ‘That’s funny because I’ve been singing ‘How Firm a Foundation,’” she recalled. “That rock will be a landscape feature whenever we have our improvement.”

But just when the needed — and costly — repair work might be scheduled remained unclear. How, when and with what funding, Bledsoe wondered, could they ever manage to rebuild?

“We knew that we were looking at a cost of about $100,000 since our insurance doesn’t cover flood or mudslide damage,” she said. “Plus no one wants to take the job because access to the damage is challenging.”

Facing such a daunting expense while still processing the trauma of what she, her husband and their community lived through, Bledsoe received an unexpected lifeline through the Assistance Program of the Board of Pensions. The trusted PC(USA) agency provided her with an assistance grant to lessen some of the burden of putting her home back together.

The generous support that she received was made possible, in part, by the PC(USA)’s annual Christmas Joy Offering, a cherished Presbyterian tradition since the 1930s, which distributes gifts equally to the BOP’s Assistance Program and to the Interim Unified Agency’s Presbyterian-related schools and colleges equipping communities of color.

“Although I’ve given to the Christmas Joy Offering for years, I never thought I would be a recipient,” Bledsoe said. “It brings tears to my eyes every time I think about the generosity and immediate support of the Board of Pensions in the early days of Hurricane Helene.”

Although in retirement Bledsoe serves in a congregation — the setting where the Christmas Joy Offering is primarily promoted and received — most of her ministry has been spent outside of parish ministry in hospice and retirement communities.

After entering seminary at the age of 48 and being ordained as a PC(USA) teaching elder in 2003, Bledsoe was a chaplain in a variety of contexts as well as a co-founder, with the Rev. Dr. Mary Porter, of Ruth and Naomi Senior Outreach, which served “elder orphans” in Birmingham, Alabama.

“I’m grateful for the staff and session of the Montreat Church because it was Lynn Gilliland, our treasurer, who urged me to apply for financial assistance,” said Bledsoe. “Lynn said that with as much damage as we had, we should look into it. I really didn’t believe that we would be candidates.”

Ruth Adams, director of the Assistance Program, said that, like Bledsoe, many plan members are unaware that the program’s grants are available for financial relief from a natural disaster or unexpected expense.

As Bledsoe continues to reflect both theologically and practically on how she withstood such a traumatic experience, she credits the “connectionalism” of the PC(USA) in preparing her way forward.

Bledsoe also acknowledged with gratitude the outpouring of resources from every level of the PC(USA) that continue to sustain her and her neighbors, including Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, Montreat Conference Center, the Presbytery of Western North Carolina, Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church (Asheville) and Black Mountain Presbyterian Church, which receives the Christmas Joy Offering.

“It bears repeating that we should all support the Christmas Joy Offering, not because we might benefit from it,” said Bledsoe, “but because we all belong to each other and we belong to God.”

Give to the Christmas Joy Offering to help the Assistance Program of the Board of Pensions support our leaders: past, present and future.