Samaritan members grateful for response of Body of Christ in aftermath of Alabama tornado

(Aaron Crawford gives a tour of his destroyed home in this video.)

In the midst of destruction, Samaritan Ministries members Aaron and Kelly Crawford and their nine children are praising God for His hand of protection during an April 27 tornado in northeast Alabama and thanking the Body of Christ for its help in the aftermath.

The Crawfords’ home was blown apart as they and three other families took shelter in the basement. But their faith has been strengthened, if anything, by the response to their needs.

“We’re called to take care of our fellow brothers and sisters, and that’s exactly what the Body of Christ has done,” Aaron said. “Not that I wish this kind of disaster on anyone, but hopefully, after this is over, I’ll have a clear picture of what my calling will be as a member of the Body of Christ that when someone else goes through a tragedy or destruction like this that we’ll be there, no doubt about it, we’ll be there to help, in whatever way. If it’s just to comfort someone, to hold their hand, to pray with them, whatever.”

The other families had come over to the Crawfords’ home, which Aaron said has “been a gathering place for this type of thing” over the years, as it became apparent that the storms, which had already hit Tuscaloosa and Birmingham, were headed toward the Shoal Creek Valley area. Once the warnings had become sufficiently serious, Aaron said, the families hunkered down in smaller rooms in the basement, such as a laundry room and storage room.

“Honestly, we don’t take storm warnings as seriously as we did this one,” Aaron said Monday, May 23, from a summer home loaned to them by some friends. “I have to give that credit to the Lord.”

What was later judged to be an F4 tornado, with winds of more than 200 mph, hit shortly after that.

“The air pressure began to rise, almost like in a jet when it takes off, and there was this kind of wah-wah sound, and then suddenly that stopped and we heard stuff crashing down everywhere,” Aaron said. “It was so intense there for a minute I thought the house was going to come down on top of us. I thought for a split second, ‘This is it.’ We were all just praying out loud for God to be merciful and protect us. And then, it just suddenly stopped. It was 30, 40 seconds maybe.”

Aaron thought the house had perhaps lost its metal roof and suffered some more damage, but when he rounded the stairway and looked upstairs … there wasn’t any upstairs. He saw blue sky. The house had been leveled.

He headed back to his wife and children and told them to prepare themselves for a shock, but before they left the storage room in which they had taken shelter, they knelt in prayer and thanked God for sparing them.

By the next morning, they would be thanking God for sending His hands and feet in the form of family, friends, and fellow church members. Shortly after dawn, a Christian friend from a neighboring town drove up and told Aaron that a man was on the way with a cattle trailer to round up the Crawfords’ livestock, consisting of some milking cows, horses and a few other animals. All day long that Thursday, there was “a constant flow of people coming to help, to dig through debris, help us salvage what was still there.”

“People handed me wads of money, cash and checks, saying, ‘We know you’re going to have needs.’

“I can’t even name them all,” Aaron said. “It’s amazing what God’s provided through all this. I imagine realistically it would be hard to call it a blessing, but for us it’s a huge blessing to see what the Body of Christ is doing.”

Christ Church of Branch Cove, the Crawfords’ home church, is raising money for them and another family to meet needs as they put their lives back together. Aaron, who works in construction, said the house debris has been cleared away, and they expect to have walls up for their new house sometime in June.

The Crawfords are asking for prayer for financial provision and wisdom as they begin the task of building their new house on the foundation of the old one. Aaron also asked that people pray for emotional peace for their children, some of whom are understandably still upset by the experience of living through the tornado.

But, in general, the family continues to marvel at God’s provision in the aftermath of the storm that came through their lives nearly a month ago.