ybvdadminuser(RNS) — There are no words.
What does someone say to the person who has lost their home, their church and their entire town?
There are no words to describe the gut-wrenching, nauseating pain, there are no words that can rise to the surface that will put an end to the deep sorrow. In the days after the devastating Palisades fire, there are simply no words.
People ask me what it’s like to be a pastor in the Palisades right now, after we have experienced the loss of homes, our church and our beloved little town. There is nothing in seminary — or even in life — that can prepare you for something like this.
In the aftermath of this unspeakable tragedy, it feels as though the entire world has shifted below our feet. While this is not Ukraine, or the horrific war that has raged in Gaza, this is horrific. The devastation is so heartbreaking, and so real.
The town we called home is gone. The houses of my people have been reduced to toxic ash, the church where we gathered to experience joy and hope is gone — all lost to the flames of a voracious, all-consuming fire.
In the past week, I have found myself doing things that I never imagined doing before; being invited to search and pray for a loved one lost in the debris, or comforting people who now possess only the clothes on their backs, who have lost everything in their world. It would be one thing if we lost some homes, but the church still stood, or the church was burned to the ground and homes were saved.
But all is gone.
I am hearing countless stories of loss and heartache from my people. One nonagenarian recently lost her husband to Alzheimer’s, and then, as her stability declined, she was told she could no longer drive, and lost her car and her freedom. The final blow: Her house, her church, her town, her life of over 60 years in the Palisades when up in smoke. Her children arrive tomorrow to pick her up and take her to live with them in Northern California.
She is not the first to tell me that she feels like Job.
We gathered for the first time the Sunday after the fires in a borrowed fellowship hall from a sister church nearby. People walked through the doors shell-shocked and weeping, still numb from the week’s tragic events. But we prayed. And we sang together, and we sang through the tears.
Psalm 23 tells us, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” Now is the time for us to truly hold tight to these words, and to understand their deep and real meaning.
But how does one do this?
Even as a pastor, I don’t have any answers for these questions right now. All I know is that God is calling us to hold tight, to hold fast and to keep our eyes on God. I am asking our church to remember that the church is not a building or a place — it is her people. And we have to hold tight to this realization right now more than ever. We have to be reminded that when in times of stress, we hurt the people that we love the most, because we know that they will always love us, but we need to give each other an extra measure of grace and patience during these dark times.
We have to remember that God is present in all things, and through all things — we just need to look for God. We need to look for hope.
How does one comfort someone who has lost it all? There are no words. No magic pixie dust, no incantation, no time machine to erase the pain and loss. Pastors can’t do those things. But we can walk with our people. We can listen. We can cry with them. We can remind them that they are not alone.
In the coming days and weeks and months and years, I know that we will see beautiful acts of God that come before us to bring us comfort and hope, and peace and joy. I know this without a shadow of doubt.
We are all traveling together in this life, and now, for a great long while, we need to travel even closer. Closer to Jesus, closer to one another, holding God’s hand, ever so tighter, and one another as well.
(The Rev. Grace Park, DMin., is associate pastor of Pacific Palisades Presbyterian Church, which was one of more than a dozen houses of worship destroyed in the recent California wildfires. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of RNS.)
