By David Farlow

When Kirk Bookout was watching the news Thursday morning and learned of the flooding in Findlay, Ohio, his first concern was for our local churches in the area. So he picked up the phone and began calling.

Downtown Findlay is flooded and one thousand people are displaced, said the church administrator for StoneBridge Church of God during her conversation with Bookout, a staff member with the Church of God Ministries. “The church is being used as a base of operations for the Red Cross, said Barb Brennan, church administrator, “and the pastoral staff are out in the community helping,” Brennan added that several people who attend the church have been displaced by the flooding.

The situation in the nearby town of Shelby, Ohio, was a slightly better Bookout learned when he contacted First Church of God in Shelby. None of the church members had to be evacuated, but many of their basements have been flooded. The church staff is out in the community there as well, helping people to cope with the situation.

We ask that the greater church community lift these congregations, their members, and communities up in prayer as they deal with the aftermath of the flooding.