LONG DAYS, ETERNAL REWARDS

GREENEVILLE — Although the campus of Grace Baptist Church was not directly impacted by Hurricane Helene, the church body certainly has been.

Since last September, when storms and flooding tore through the Johnson City area, the Grace Baptist congregation has been fully engaged in the recovery efforts, working together with Tennessee Baptist Disaster Relief to help families and individuals put their lives back together.

Pastor Travis Tyler has led the charge. He has been fully embedded in the process since the beginning,  tackling a wide assortment of responsibilities and working relentlessly.

Grace Baptist has been hosting DR teams for a full year, providing meals and “a home base” for those who have traveled to Johnson City to help with the recovery efforts.

Tyler said it’s been exhausting work, but said the past year has featured some of the most rewarding and fulfilling days of his ministry.

“It’s been almost intoxicating,” he said. “To bring people hope — and to do it at this level — and to do it in the name of Christ has just been awesome. And never, in my 24 years of being a pastor, have I felt I was making a bigger difference than when I was doing DR.”

Though no one can really be prepared for the type of immediate devastation that Johnson City experienced, Tyler said his pastoral training helped equip him for this situation. It also doesn’t hurt that Tyler has building, and rebuilding, in his bloodlines.

“I feel like seminary partially prepared me for this in terms of the fact that my biblical training and biblical knowledge gave me some of the tools I needed for disaster relief,” he said. “Also, an advantage that I had was I have a construction background. My dad does brick and block masonry. So, I felt like disaster relief was a point where all the things that I’ve been trained in and learned from converge together.”

Tyler poured so much of himself into the DR efforts that he eventually needed a sabbatical to recuperate. “I told the deacons, ‘I think I need it,’” Tyler said. The deacons and the church fully supported the idea, and Tyler took a much-needed break in the summer, traveling to Mexico.

Diving right in

In the aftermath of the storm, many of the residents in Johnson City did not have cellphone service. Tyler, however, happened to be with a service provider that did not lose its functionality — and he become a person of contact right from the start.

“I started getting calls immediately,” he said. “ I mean, I started getting calls the day of (the flooding). The first call was for me to come down to the high school and minister to the people who were in the shelter. And from then on, it was every day — 12, 14, 16, sometimes 18, hours a day. I was getting back to people on text messages at midnight and 1 o’clock in the morning.”

Tyler quickly reached out to Pete Tackett, pastor of Antioch Baptist Church in Johnson City.

“He was the first person that I made contact with as far as cooperation goes,” Tyler said. “Pete is one of the best. Just top-notch. And he got me connected with other people in DR.”

From there, Tyler began to take the lead on the recovery efforts for that area. “I kind of functioned as a local disaster relief coordinator for some time,” he said.

Tyler noted that First Baptist Church, Roan Mountain, where his good friend Geren Street is pastor, became a critical spot for survivors and for resources. Grace Baptist soon did, too.

“We made the decision early on that we were going to house the DR teams coming in,” Tyler said.

Tyler said when he brought the idea (of hosting DR team) before the church, the support was unanimous.  “The whole church stood up in agreement,” he said.

Meanwhile, Tyler went to work.

“I started organizing side-by-side teams to go out in the areas like Roan Mountain, distributing food and resources,” he said. “I also got calls for help from Poga, but at first, we couldn’t get over there. I damaged my truck the first day trying to get there.”

A long haul

Tyler said he knew the commitment to disaster relief would not be a short-term thing.

“I’m not sure the members realized it was going to be so long, but I did,” he said. “I tried to make it clear to them — you’re not going to get your favorite parking spot or your normal spot for birthday parties all the time. But the work we’re doing is invaluable and it has eternal impact.”

Tyler said being involved with the disaster relief efforts has opened the door for gospel conversations and for conservations about God’s providence.

“In Jeremiah, the Bible tells us God is the author of calamity,” he said. “That was in context of judgment on Israel. I believe that God reveals himself as a big God. So there’s going to continue to be calamities.”

But God is faithful through it all, Tyler said, and He has used Grace Baptist — and Tyler himself — as a means to accelerate the healing process.

“I feel like my main role has been to just be a ‘connecter’” Tyler said. “I have tried to connect the need to the resources, and the facilities to the volunteers.”

And that, in a nutchell, is what Tennessee Baptist Disaster Relief is all about.