by Anthony Rodriguez
Valley Hope Pastor

I live in Swannanoa. You can Google it, if you’d like. Unfortunately, at this point, you may have heard of it. A lot has happened in a few weeks. I sat down to write some of it out so I could really try to remember these days. It’s very long. I don’t care.

Our church is trying to do good work in our community and we will continue to do our best for as long as we can. People have been super generous to us, for which we are grateful. If you want to join that generosity, donate above.

I was planning to go to a committee meeting at presbytery (the regional collection of churches in our denomination) on Friday morning. The meeting was close enough that I would be able to wake up early, get on my way, and make it in time for our committee to get down to business.

I heard the power go off before the sun rose and I thought, “Maybe I should wait until I can see what everything looks like.”

The previous couple of days dumped a quantity of water that went from annoying to depressing to concerning. The measurements at Asheville airport before Helene arrived were almost comically large. There was truly something almost funny at the size of the numbers, a kind of strange rooting interest to see how high these completely absurd numbers would get. But that was always soon chased by a quietly horrifying thought: “The hurricane isn’t here yet.”

Many of us were only dimly aware of the darkness on the horizon. My wife, never one to be accused of being a news junkie, said to me on Thursday, after a couple days of mild illness and general laying about, “So the worst is over right?” At that point, I already had a pit in my stomach and I said out loud the words that were drumming louder: “The hurricane isn’t here yet.”

When I laid back down and tried to sleep, I heard the wind pick up and lie down and pick up and lie down. It didn’t sound too terribly loud in our cove, our little tucked nook of Swannanoa. I finally got out of bed and texted my committee head and said I probably shouldn’t make the meeting, but perhaps I’d make it for presbytery. I considered that probable, actually. Soon thereafter, all the bars on my cell phone disappeared. The hurricane was here. Now.

The wind was never particularly terrifying where we were. Sure, I looked at the trees around my house and wondered how long they could hold the completely sodden ground. But I never heard any creaking or crying out. It was what I saw down the hill from us that made my jaw drop. The creek running through the middle of the level part of Buckeye Cove was gone.

There was a river. A large one. An angry one. A river that was roaring and ripping through, rising well above its normal stream bed. And I looked to the right and saw rivers of watery clay coming from a direction that I had never seen water flow. I put on my Chacos and a rain jacket just to walk in the raging water and make sure there wasn’t a moving mountainside at the headwaters. There wasn’t, that I saw. At least not moving quickly. But as I saw this cataclysm of waters on the very small scale of our very small community, I began to think: This could be bad.

Cell signal was gone and would be gone for a long time. It was the first true frustration. I could not text my parents to see if they were alright. I could not tell my sisters that we were fine. I could not check on others or get news of the larger valley. It was infuriating and isolating and scary.

I left our side of Highway 70 as soon as I could, as soon as the worst was passed, to see if I could find a way to my parents. My wife suggested that it was likely that trees would be down on the smaller roads we ordinarily take to get there, so we ought to head down 70, a main artery for our community. We went as far as we good before we saw the real river, which was not even close to finished raging. It was over the highway. It was through the bridge. Eventually, buildings, a hotel, were removed from their foundations. We pulled to the side of the road and I just thought, “Oh no.”

We went home and I later went the other direction on Hwy 70 to see if I could find a way to my parents, find a way to our church building, find a way into the heart of Swannanoa. I was cut off in the other direction by the Swannanoa River. My brain could not compute what I was seeing: The river was a furious, frothing lake that had spread through the entirety of our small town. Everything was… gone. That’s what it looked like. I went home and I just said to my wife, “Swannanoa is gone.” She was confused, not able to understand what I was saying. I couldn’t even understand what I was saying.

Life accelerated quickly after that long, graciously quiet day (for us). The next day, we found a way to my parents. They took our kids and left town, hoping to make it to Georgia to stay at their lake house. We eventually found service hours and hours later to hear they’d made it easily on (apparently) the only road out of town and found all of the hallmarks of civilization that were completely gone for us.

Power gone. It would be gone at our house for two weeks. With it, our well water. Internet? A hilarious rumor from the past. Cell service? Frustratingly difficult to find.

And homes. So many homes.

Gone.

Athletic fields were debris fields where people’s homes and, apparently, people themselves, were strewn as if thrown by a demented giant toddler beset by frustration.

River silt was everywhere. You could see the mark on remaining trees where the waters had once risen to and your mind could not comprehend how you, standing up above and yards away safely on the remainder of a road, were where the new riverbed once was. Sunday morning, when I parked further away and walked to our church building to see how it fared, I was sliding around on riverbed and listening to water dripping off everything.

Our world was saturated. Over-saturated. My kids’ only hometown looked like what every disaster movie had ever tried to approximate. This is our home, a mess we could not turn off. Our lives.

It was, immediately, impossible to take in. An enormous knot too terribly large to untangle. How do you get shipping containers out of treetops? How do you put back together a mobile home slung half a mile away?

We are beginning to find the answers.

This is the remarkable thing: I have seen zero bodies, mourned over zero dead family members or church members or friends. People I love have taken massive losses to their businesses, but count themselves as grateful people, alive and dry and whole. All of that is true and it’s still the worst thing I’ve ever seen in person and it isn’t particularly close.

And yet.

I have seen some of the most amazing things. I cannot express adequately how quickly help has rushed in to chase the floodwaters. People have run to us to bring anything and everything. People from all over the country have sent working crews and machinery and groceries and money and an endless list of other things. And anything we’ve needed, we have had a superabundance. Eventually, we had to tell everyone that our church building was too full, that no, we could not accept more help right now. Not that we will never need it, but that our storehouses are not large enough. People who, just a few weeks ago, could not say “Swannanoa” if I’d just told them where I live, now informed me that their eyes, their prayers were on Swannanoa and they would not leave us.

And the most amazing thing I have seen is the residents of Swannanoa have decide that our neighbors really, really mean something to us. Many people were already much better than me at this, of course. So they were on the leading edge to take care of people. But all of us Swannanoans, we make it our norm now to see anyone and everyone and to ask, “Are you ok? Do you need help? Can I help you?”

My church has found itself at the strange intersection of providence. Of mercy. The waters came to the middle of our driveway and no further. At the end of our street, neighbors pulled kids and parents out of a second story deck to pull them to safety, fighting for their lives as they were swept away by the current and caught by those mysterious storage containers.

And in our parking lot, day by day, evening by evening, I have seen the sweat and tears of our community used to provide food and water and toilet buckets and generators and diapers and so much more to our neighbors.

Evening by evening, our parking lot has become a dining room. And our neighborhood was invited. Our neighborhood has come.

This whole thing is indescribably exhausting. I was not sure that my brain would handle the 10,000 decisions, the weight, the responsibility that first week. I had to leave to go see my kids, to celebrate my daughter’s birthday, to be able to breathe. To come back required a deep breath, a surrender, a plunging into the coldest waters I’ve ever swam in, the icy grip of near-death and despair.

But, day by day, weary step by weary step, we’re all making it.

And do you know what our parking lot/dining room looks like? Not grim survival. Not war victims grimly staring into the distance. No, what I have found at those tables evening after evening is… joy.

It is so surprising to me, even now. I know so many people want some happy conclusion which a) isn’t possible for many people in our valley, those who are homeless and/or mourning and b)is a long way coming for the rest of us who, again, live here. It’s messy thing and I was resistant, quite early on, to being used for safe and dry and comfortable people’s emotional comfort and titillation. I think I, and many others, are already tired of the people driving through Swannanoa with their phones out, filming our ruins. I know it’s hard to capture and spreading the word helps. But still.

The questions presented by the wreckage are real and too difficult to be tritely used for the movie version of these events. My near-13-year-old asked me, after days of wondering if her friends were dead, the question that haunts almost everyone at times like this: Why? Why does this happen? Why would God not step in? You can see those things on your screens and ask that theoretically. Our people are asking it entirely differently.

Where was He? Where is He? Where is God?

But it’s the craziest thing. At those tables every night, I can’t shake the feeling that despair is going to lose this one. Death will not have final say on Swannanoa’s story. Death will not have the final word on the world at large. There’s flooding and ruin and chaos and destruction, but I have seen signs, evidence, time and time again in these weeks that there is a stronger story, an older magic in the world. It’s so tempting to see only carnage and ask “where is God,” but even if, in my lament, my anger, I wanted only those questions and objections, every night at these tables I keep seeing whispers of an answer. I can’t help thinking with chills sweeping over me, “Oh there You are.” I cannot tell you the number of times we have seen someone needing a specific thing of some kind and then, within minutes, a stranger walks up with the precise number of that thing. It’s almost comical at this point. The examples border on the absurd. And those stories don’t even begin to encompass the thing we are feeling at our tables, the sense that the God of Mercy, the God Who Sees, is putting us at tables with one another to see and be seen, feasting in a way that feels so deeply and divinely life-giving.

I am confused and bewildered and tired and uncomfortable and very much in over my head. There’s no denying that. It’s true for all of us. I don’t know the answer to our toughest questions in the dark. But I also cannot help but see that there’s more going on here. And there’s something coming that will overshadow every corner of the worst the darkness can muster. I can’t get over this sense that God really is here. I can’t shake the conviction that our church has a name for a reason, a reason we didn’t know until now.

Our name is Valley Hope. And it’s what God is doing in Swannanoa.

Valley Hope-

We are just wrapping up another week of a marathon effort that will last as long as the rubble and the rebuild does. We have served dinner outside our building every night in conjunction with an outdoor “market” where neighbors can get their essentials. We will continue to do this in the upcoming week, with a market only on Sunday at noon and market plus meal Monday through Friday from 4:30-6 (with volunteers arriving at 4). If you’d like to help us this coming week, we’d love to see you. You can sign up here: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0D4AA9AB22ABFBC52-52038378-valley#/ Please feel free to come eat dinner with us and our neighbors. Make some space at your table for a new acquaintance that might become a friend. You can continue to use the charging station and WIFI, which is available all day. We will also continue to offer assistance with FEMA applications. We’re also hoping to expand our potable/filtered water capabilities to help address the long-term water needs in Swannanoa. If you happen to know of vehicles that are just waiting to be donated, please let us know. It’s a pressing need for many in our larger community.

Thank you so much to all of the donors and volunteers who have been moved with compassion and moved towards us and with us. Truly, we will not be able to see Swannanoa rebuilt without lots of help and so much of it has already come from seemingly every direction. Thank you.

Tomorrow morning, we will again worship at the building at 9am. We will only have one service, as many of our folks are still out of town. We will not have Sunday school or children’s programming, as the building is not ready yet. As power rapidly returns to many homes and the realities of water issues and school sets in, we expect more people to return to the area. We can’t wait for you to come back and see all of the amazing things that are happening in our Valley and in our lives. As more people return, we will shift back to two services at some point. We will figure that out as those variables present themselves.

I want to encourage those who aren’t in our community, either for the moment because of living conditions or because you don’t live here and are just tracking with us (which you’re welcome to do!):

I continue to be amazed by what God is doing in our Valley. I wouldn’t wish a catastrophic flood on anyone. Ever! Life here has been challenging, to say the least. But it has still been good. There have been VERY good things afoot. We know our neighbors better than ever. We have been able to share ordinary joys and real sorrows with people who before we didn’t even know to name. We have seen incredible kindness and generosity from so many people. Whatever you might see from afar, I can’t imagine you can see all this goodness. Strangely, I feel a part of the privileged few, rather than just the poor disadvantaged disaster victims. The loss and lament is real. But so is this joy that we get to experience together. If you can, come and see it. Come and be a part of it.

I’m looking forward to worshipping with everyone tomorrow. I can’t wait to celebrate together who God is and what He is doing.

Gratefully,

Anthony Rodriguez

SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/valleyhopeepc/october-7th-2024-1st-sermon-post-helene?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/valley-hope-church/id1274509915?i=1000672060977

The road to recovery will be long. To partner with us in helping to rebuild our community you can donate here (100% goes to help all people in our community): 
DONATE-> http://www.valleyhope.church/helene

THANK YOU! You all have been amazing and we will continue to need your help in the coming weeks and months. Please be patient as we organize!

#swannanoa #asheville #helene #hurricanehelene #hurricane#donate #hurricanerelief #hurricanerecovery #blackmountain#montreat #disasterrelief #disaster

Today, I am writing to let you know that we will worship at our building on Sunday at 9am. Many of our church are out of town, so our assumption is that one service will be sufficient. If you’re still around, come on down. You can get to our building only from the east. You can come from Black Mountain on Old 70. Maybe leave a little extra travel time. We never know how things change, but we will be as comfortable as possible. We will worship and receive of God’s ordinary, miraculous grace together. It’ll be fun! Join us if you’re nearby. (I should say, in case it wasn’t assumed, that we will not have children’s ministry this Sunday. That will return at some point. But… it’s a bit of a mess in there at the moment.)

Thank you so much for all the ways so many of you are jumping in with us. A fellow pastor dropped a couple things at our building Thursday night and he said our people are amazing. I can only say I was unsurprised and profoundly grateful at the same time. We have people showing up. We have people NOT showing up because they’re helping elsewhere, which is fantastic. And people have been so so generous toward our Helene fund. If you’re in the area and would like to be generous with your time, your sweat while work may be on pause (and beyond) please sign up to volunteer. We have two sign-ups:
Help handout meals and supplies: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0D4AA9AB22ABFBC52-52038378-valley#/
Help with FEMA, identifying needs and child care: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0D4AA9AB22ABFBC52-52065584-valley

If you have needs right now please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and we will do everything we can to get you the help you need. Whether it is supplies, prayer, pastoral care, clean-up, etc.

We are at a strange moment where we continue to have to tell folks, “We really do need all the help and all the things! Just… not this second. And not how we might be envisioning it.” We really can’t take more supply drop-offs right now because there’s so much. But people will need water every. single. day. We will need that water soon and we’d love it in a week or so. So hold onto it! Or have people send us money so we can buy it soon. https://valleyhope.church/helene

I am profoundly grateful to be your pastor for so many reasons. All of you blow me away, you humble me. I have gotten to work with Amy Berry and Daniel Lancaster and Rick Tozier and Jen Fraser and Lindsey Barnett and Chris Cronin and so many more who have worked SO HARD doing so much work. I am incredibly grateful for them, for all of you. I can’t wait to worship together on Sunday. And when you get home, if you left town, the party will just get all the richer. This is a marathon that we’re running, but we’re going to party along the way.

I can’t wait to see it.

Thank you all,

Hello everyone, we want to keep you updated with the latest on how to connect, who to connect with and how to get help. Please see this information below. 

IF YOU…
WANT TO VOLUNTEER
Contact JEN FRASER: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / 828-273-2525
We need volunteers both locally and remotely. Please let us know if you are interested in helping in any way! Please be aware that we may not use you immediately. But as we get more organized we will be calling on you! We are keeping a careful record of everyone offering help and will reach back out as we travel the long road ahead.
WANT TO GIVE
MONEY
Give here: https://www.valleyhope.church/helene or contact LINDSEY BARNETT: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / (770) 882-6840
SUPPLIES
Contact AMY BERRY: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / 828-989-9666 (Note: We are currently full on most things!)
HAVE A NEED
Contact JEN FRASER: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / 828-273-2525

Supplies and Meals
We also are offering these services at our church building (115 Rockdale Ave, Swannanoa):
Monday - Friday 4-6pm
Hot Dinner, supplies, food pantry, water, baby supplies, wifi, charging station, toilet water, toiletries, Help with FEMA applications, 24/7 we have water containers for getting buckets of water for flushing.

Sunday @9am - Worship Service
@10:30-12pm - food pantry, water, baby supplies, wifi, charging station
If you have a need and cannot email or call, just show up at the church (115 Rockdale Ave, Swannanoa) from 9am-7pm Monday - Friday and someone will assist you.

If you need prayer, someone to talk to, wellness checks, or other questions, contact:
DANIEL LANCASTER: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / 910-622-7994

*Note: This is the plan until October 13th. We may change course after that.

Valley Hope-

I’ve felt recently, as an act of discipline, that I needed to be quicker to accept help. I tend to respond to any offer of help by saying “No I’m good.” But rather than just getting by, I need to be more willing to say “Ok thank you.” This is something on which God has been working with me.

And then Helene poured a billion gallons of water down our throats. Suddenly, it is quite a bit easier to say “Ok thank you.”

We have been inundated with supplies, offers of supplies, people just driving up with stuff. It is truly overwhelming. We are so so grateful for all that people have done and offered to do. Right now, if anyone could donate a large storage building, that may be highest on our wants list. Water would be number two. Seriously though, we've received a generous offer of portable storage containers so if you have either a building that could be used for storage or easily accessible land that we could put these portable storage containers on let us know at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Truly, though, we are so grateful. Help is coming from all directions. Please pray that we have wisdom to set up a long term way of managing all this aid. We know we won’t be on the news anymore sometime not too long from now. And all those businesses will still be ruined. So many houses will be feeling winter winds through holes and gashes. We will need that help for the long-term and we want to plan for that now. Again, please feel free to share our giving link: https://valleyhope.church/helene. This helps us continue to be able to get what we need down the line. One of our neighbors said “Asheville and Black Mountain will get all the help. Everyone always forgets Swannanoa.” We mean to show her that we will not forget.

If you are considering coming back soon, please be thinking about how you might spend your time serving. There will be 5,000 opportunities and I imagine they’re all fantastic. We will continue to do our best to serve people on Rockdale Ave and in Grovemont so that they continue to have food, water, sanitation, and any other essential needs fulfilled. Yesterday, we had help setting up two giant containers of creek water so our neighbors could more easily fill buckets for flushing toilets. Things like this will continue to be an issue for weeks and we could use your hands to continue to offer support to our side of the river.

Thanks so much for tracking with us and praying for us and touching base. We feel really supported and loved. Thank you. We can’t wait to see you all in person, handing out water, cultivating communities that live out the life-changing hope of Jesus.

Grace and peace,
Anthony

You can donate using the button above.  Further offers of help can be sent to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Thank you SO much! We are overwhelmed by your kindness and generosity as we face the long road ahead of us.

Each day we are taking the supplies you have so generously sent and canvasing the neighborhood meeting the needs as we can of each person we connect with. We have a fair amount of supplies at the moment that we have stored off-site.  Each day we bring in what's needed to meet the needs in our immediate community.  So right now, any funds donated will be used to replinish those supplies when we are ready.  Your generosity is greatly appreciated and all of it will be used to help everyone we can in our neighborhood. We covet your prayers and appreciate any donations you make. Thank you thank you thank you!

Valley Hope-

Greetings from Day Whatever This Is. Things are definitely happening on the ground here in Swannanoa and we’re so grateful. I truly get choked up seeing line crews from all over the country. We so value their work. Black Mountain has seen loads of improvements. Swannanoa… we’ve got a long long way to go.

I’m so grateful for the ways some of our people have started showing up and extending hands to our neighbors. This is our goal right now: Serve Rockdale Ave. If we can get more, we will do more.

We would love for our building to be a place where people can regularly experience provisioning in a variety of ways. Food and especially water are so crucial. We have had people generously bring us SO MUCH. It would be helpful if folks would consider giving financially using the give now button above so we can distribute goods and services further down the line as needs continue to pray out. We will also run out of ways to store stuff! We would LOVE volunteers who would like to help us man charging stations or food handouts each day at the building. We are beginning to organize what that might look like, especially as communications improve and people return. Keep that in mind!

And please be ready. Be ready to look someone in the eye. Introduce yourself. Hear a name. Maybe remember it (I’m kidding… that’s apparently impossible for me. I’m so sorry). Ask them how they are. So many people can get reduced down to needs. And people are more than needs! They are people! Let’s keep acting as people of hope.

Thank you so much for praying for us and thinking of us. I miss you all. I can’t wait until we can get back to cultivating communities together that will live out the hope that can only be found in Jesus.

Grace and peace,
Anthony

We are just starting to organize.  We have a first round of supplies that are pouring in so we need a little time to get those distributed. So what we need right now is funding so that we can buy exactly what's needed.  In a few days, we will need people who can help but right now we have no where to put them. So please stay tuned.