Six years ago, on November 7-9 of 2018, our local communities experienced the double trauma and heartbreak associated with the shootings at the Borderline Bar and Grill along with the Woolsey and Hill fires. Conejo families opened their homes to one another, checked in on each other, and offered many gestures of kindness. A number of our Conejo members worked long hours to comfort grieving Pepperdine students and to provide support as the campus sheltered in place for several days. For over a day, we weren’t sure if our church building had survived the fires (it was singed on three sides). The fire wasn’t fully contained until November 21.
I’ll never forget our worship assembly on November 11. Our church building was still under evacuation and so we secured one of the AMC theaters at the Oaks Mall, which the management graciously comped us. We gathered and shared hugs and tears, laments and prayers, as well as songs of grief and hope. For a community that was feeling worn thin, wrung out, and bone weary, that time together was a healing balm.
As I reflect back on that most unusual week, I’m reminded of several important lessons.
For starters, when we suffer trauma and loss, we grieve. And I believe we’re at our best when we grieve together, bearing each other’s burdens, praying and caring for one another, singing and lamenting in major and minor keys. We do all this especially as a church family, but we also grieve in our neighborhoods and larger communities as we remember our shared humanity.
Secondly, we help one another. We dig out and rebuild. We listen and learn. We share our stories and our resources. We seek to make a better world by binding up wounds, helping heal emotional scars, creating more just laws, and overcoming evil with good. That same week, Carrie had a friend who rear ended another driver as she was evacuating the fires. The other driver, after pulling over, looked at Carrie’s friend and said, “It’s been a hard day. Let’s just let this one go.”
Third, we celebrate God’s grace wherever we find it. We thank God for the small miracles in the midst of big tragedies. We look for the hidden ways in which God brings good out of evil. We honor heroes who stand tall and heroes who fall in the line of duty. We say “thank you” to all who opened homes, offered safety, shared information, cooked food, made thoughtful preparations, and effectively carried out emergency plans. We celebrate how when life and nature give us their worst, we humans have the capacity to come together and give our best.
We won’t soon forget November of 2018. My prayer is that as the future continues to unfold, we will continue to grieve together, to help one another, and to celebrate God’s hidden grace. May we also continue to find the miracle of new life sprouting up wherever death and destruction have threatened to overwhelm us.
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