Around 2 a.m. on a Sabbath morning in early January, residents of Baden, a section of St. Louis City, woke to find their apartment building on fire. As the building was not up to code, there was only one way in and out, trapping residents in their apartments and forcing many to leap from second- and third-floor windows to safety.
“Miracles happened that morning,” states Trevor Barnes, pastor at the Northside Seventh-day Adventist Church in St. Louis. “Those who jumped survived with only minor injuries—including a pregnant woman.”
As events unfolded, the Red Cross began looking for a disaster shelter for those displaced by the fire. Their sights fell on the Northside Church, a recent addition to their list of potential shelter locations.
“It wasn’t by accident the Red Cross thought of us,” Barnes says; “They called us because we had formed a relationship with them and other partners in our community. They know us.” Northside Church hosts quarterly community partners meetings with key stakeholders in the area, which representatives from Red Cross attend. “We share resources and vision,” Barnes explains. “We share what we’re doing as a church, and try to see which ways we can help each other achieve our goals. That relationship is what brought the Red Cross to our door that January morning.”
Ernie Williamson, Northside Church member and shelter coordinator, says initially when they were contacted about the fire survivors he was overwhelmed with the responsibility. “Then I reminded myself we’d worked hard to be ready for this, and I wasn’t doing it on my own,” he comments. “When it came to stepping up and helping, the response was incredible. Our church really came through.”
Together, the church set up cots, assembled privacy screens, prepared food, staffed a welcome table, and visited with those who sought shelter. Barnes, among others, simply listened to their stories and prayed with those who wished for it.
Beyond lip service
Over a year ago, when the Red Cross first approached Northside Church about becoming a disaster shelter for the community, Barnes says they weren’t sure they could do it. “Ultimately, though, we asked ourselves, if we were in the situation where we needed a safe place to be, what would we want?” he recalls.
An elder quoted 1 John 3:18: “Dear children, let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth,” and that’s when the group knew what they needed to do. “It needs to not just be lip service that we show Christ’s love; we need to demonstrate it,” says Barnes. “We knew we had to step forward and take care of our community.”
The county in which Northside Church resides (North County) faces several challenges, primary among them education, housing, health and food security. Disaster preparedness is also a major issue, as their part of the county is a floodway. Should there be an earthquake in their area, the Mississippi River would flow backwards and their neighborhood would be underwater.
“We started a ministry to address these issues, but as you can imagine, funding services like that is a huge challenge,” says Jonathan Head, leader of the Community Partners program. “So we brainstormed a solution: a team of organizations dedicated to alleviating these primary issues in our community to leverage our combined assets and better serve the people.”
Building strong partnerships
In April 2023, the Northside Church held their first community partnerships meeting. Over the past two years, their group has grown to include, in addition to the American Red Cross, St. Louis County Emergency Management, Higher Education Consortium of St. Louis, a behavioral clinic, Missouri State Emergency Management, and local utility companies.
Together, these organizations and agencies plan workshops for community members throughout the year, basing their content on feedback from annual town hall meetings and data collected by each entity.
“As a team, we discuss what is most needed, what we’re each working on, and how we can collaborate and improve what is being done,” Head explains. “We have a holistic approach and our group is a one-stop shop for anyone in need.”
It was as a result of this partnership that the Northside Church became an official disaster shelter, the only one in their county and the only Adventist disaster shelter in the Central States Conference. Additionally, as a result of the regular community partners meetings, the church was able to help the fire survivors beyond their immediate shelter needs—they were able to utilize their connections to help those affected by the fire transition from disaster shelter to transitional housing, and from welfare lodging into more stable housing. “Those connections with other organizations in our community were vital,” Williamson says.
Both credible and caring
Barnes says that seeking relationships builds trust and understanding. “People aren’t going to listen to you until you gain credibility,” he comments. “One of the greatest benefits to ministering to the community is that you build that credibility so that people are willing to listen to you. The truth is that no one cares what you have to say unless they know that you care first.”
Entities across the state are now reaching out to the Partnership and asking them to help set up similar groups in their areas. “Anyone can do this, really,” Head says. “Our team is made up of average, everyday people coming together for a common good.”
The group has begun moving into the public sector recently, including a partnership with Commerce Bank to provide community members with financial literacy education. They have also partnered with the National Society of Civil Engineers and National Society of Black Engineers to start a summer STEM tutoring class for students in the community, and FEMA representatives will join them later this year for a disaster preparedness forum.
Head, a political scientist, businessman, and Fulbright Scholar, points out that in any system, every step forward adds more value. “That’s what we’re doing,” he affirms. “We’re adding value to our community with each project we pursue.”
Work such as that of the Partnership spotlights the issues that tend to hide in crevices, Head says, and exposing need is vital to providing solutions.
“Disaster shelter” is more than just a designation, Williamson points out. “It’s a ministry opportunity,” he says. “We’re not just a building sitting on a street to be a museum or cathedral; we’re here to do something. We’re here to serve.”
