In June 2007, a team from Grace Fellowship Church, a Grace Brethren church in Pickerington, Ohio, made a trip to Slidell, La., to help rebuild homes destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. As a result, Grace Fellowship has joined with the Quest, a Grace Brethren church in Columbus, Ohio, to provide school supplies for children in St. Bernard Parish. (See blogpost of July 5, 2007.) Recently, ThisWeek Community Newspaper in central Ohio featured the efforts of the Pickerington church. A portion of the story is included below.

Katrina aftermath
Area church helping Ninth Ward students
The destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina reminded the nation of nature’s unfathomable power. It also reminded the nation of the power that lies within each and every person.

Nearly two years after the storm ravaged the Gulf Coast, residents are still living in federally provided trailers that line the parking lots of condemned shopping centers while they try to rebuild their cities and their lives, according to Pickerington resident Cathy Fluty.

Last month, Fluty and her family joined a community-service mission organized by Pickerington’s Grace Fellowship Church to Slidell, La., where she saw firsthand what challenges lie ahead for those left to pick up the pieces.

While working in Slidell, which is 20 miles outside of New Orleans, the Flutys met Charles Dillon, a pastor in St. Bernard Parish in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, one of the areas most devastated by the storm.

“He took us on a tour and we were just flabbergasted,” Fluty said. “Our eyes were just opened to the need of people down there.”

To read the full story, click here.