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Disaster relief teams from the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention were responding April 4 to tornado damage in three North Texas cities.
Clean-up and recovery teams from SBTC churches were working in Arlington, which sits in the south central Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, Forney, just east of Dallas, and in Joshua, southwest of Fort Worth, said Jim Richardson, SBTC director of disaster relief.
A mammoth swath of afternoon thunderstorms spawned perhaps a dozen tornadoes, the National Weather Service reported, ripping through as many as 650 houses and businesses across the Dallas-Fort Worth area. No deaths were reported from the storms that moved over a metropolitan area of 6.5 million residents.
Reports were preliminary, but at least one Southern Baptist church was damaged. A Methodist church in Arlington reported significant damage but no injuries after its preschool building, with 82 children inside, lost part of its roof. A preschool worker told a local television news crew she and the children sang “Jesus Loves Me!” as the storm passed over.
The website at Tate Springs Baptist Church in Arlington, the base for DR volunteers there, included a message that the property was OK, but that those concerned should call because the church’s email was down.
A church receptionist remarked to the TEXAN, “It jumped over us.” A few church members had damaged homes, but none of the Tate Springs flock was seriously injured.
On April 4, several neighborhoods were secured so residents and authorities could assess damage and conduct any necessary searches.
Arlington’s Grace Baptist Church had visible roof and water damage to its mission house across the street from the church. A basketball goal in the parking lot—just 50 feet from the church building—displayed the tornado’s selective torque, with a steel pole contorted downward and sideways, the backboard and goal in tact.
But the church building only had moderate roof damage. No broken windows, no structural damage, said Pastor Jimmy Hallford. No one was at the church as the tornado hit, he said.
“We are very fortunate,” Hallford added, explaining that next door to the church, the Green Oaks Nursing and Rehabilitation Center saw an entire wing crumble. Only two people inside the nursing home were injured, according to news reports.
“It’s going to open up ministry doors like all disasters do,” Hallford said. He said the day of the storm he and his neighbors were working side by side. He changed a flat tire for one neighbor who was physically unable to do it—a need he happened by, he said. Consequently, the man and his family accepted an invitation from Hallford to attend church on Sunday.
“God works all things to his glory,” Hallford said. “If it opens doors for the gospel that’s fine by me.”
Students from Grace Baptist were planning to help with clean-up in area neighborhoods on April 4, Hallford noted.
In Forney, the First Baptist Church was spared damage, but more than 70 homes were hit and 24 were reported destroyed, said Charles Treadway, executive pastor at First Baptist of Forney. Treadway said he knew of no churches damaged there.
One blessing in the storm was that no school children were injured inside a local elementary school as a tornado passed over, tossing cars from their parking spaces, Treadway said.
“It’s not as bad as it could have been. It could have been much worse.”
Treadway said SBTC DR teams would begin working in Forney on April 5, removing downed trees and limbs and other clean-up tasks.
The storms added an additional deployment for the SBTC’s DR force; volunteers began working in the Rio Grande Valley near McAllen the last week of March after flash floods soaked the area. Richardson said the McAllen teams would continue working there for another week or longer.
