Church volunteers ‘like angels’ to victims

When the water started to creep up the stairs to the second floor of her Jersey Village home, Shirley Sawyer called the police to come get her. After a few hours, the lights of a fire engine appeared outside, but the flood had created a cesspool around the house that the truck couldn’t reach.

Finally, a firefighter swam to her, caught her arm and guided her through the waters. The 60-year-old couldn’t see where she was going, and the water was up to her armpits, but slowly the legal secretary waded through the waters one arthritis-ached leg at a time.

Sawyer is just one of so many Houstonians affected by the flooding last week — but like many in the Jersey Village area, she received aid in dealing with the aftermath from volunteers at Foundry United Methodist Church.

“The Lord helped me get out of here,” Sawyer said. “If it weren’t for (Foundry volunteers), I don’t know what would happen to us down here. They’re like angels.”

Around 10 a.m. Tuesday, Senior Pastor Godfrey Hubert drove himself to Foundry Church. On the way, he realized he didn’t want a normal day of work — he felt blessed to have been spared by the floods and a calling to help the people whose homes had been plowed through with floodwater.

“It had been 24 hours, and we hadn’t done anything,” Hubert said. “

So, he shot an email to his congregation, and in just an hour and a half — almost as swiftly as the flash flood swept over the city — five teams gathered and were handing out supplies and helping clean houses.

After mobilizing cleanup crews Tuesday, Hubert decided to continue the efforts throughout the week.

“If people are flooded, they’re just starting,” Hu- bert said. “Let’s not move on too quickly.”

On Sunday, the lawns in Sawyer’s subdivision sprawled with heaping piles of the owners’ belongings. Sawyer sighed with a sad familiarity at the sheetrock cut from the walls, the air conditioning unit that wasn’t working, and the fridge that volunteers were wheeling out of the kitchen after lightning knocked it out of commission. “It’s déjà vu,” she said. Back at Foundry, volunteers transformed a worship service chamber into a pantry for donations. Vern Howard, the lay pastor of the church, shoveled food and cleaning supplies into bags, which then were shipped out to the community.

“I’m just glad I got to be a part,” he said.

Howard, a 74-year-old chaplain of two fire departments, helps firefighters deal with loss and hardship. He is accustomed to dealing with catastrophic events.

“We want to show our love to (the community) during these hard times,” Howard said. “There’s more to Christianity than preaching.”

Sitting in her garage amid a small pile of salvaged goods, Sawyer said she appreciates the work of the volunteers. She’s waiting on President Barack Obama to make a declaration of disaster in Houston so that FEMA will bring relief.

Later, a darkening sky gave way to rain, and droplets pelted the trash-littered subdivision where around a dozen Foundry volunteers were left sweeping sheetrock crumbs. Sawyer hobbled up — her arthritis was acting up again, she said — and walked outside.

“I better go roll up my windows,” Sawyer said.

She had dealt with enough water damage for one week.