{"id":8189,"date":"2006-12-05T23:04:08","date_gmt":"2006-12-06T04:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/newswire\/?p=8189"},"modified":"2011-07-06T08:36:28","modified_gmt":"2011-07-06T13:36:28","slug":"4622","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/newswire\/2006\/12\/05\/4622\/","title":{"rendered":"Storm-Ravaged Churches Struggle with Deductibles"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>CHICAGO, IL (December 5, 2005)\u00a0 &#8211; Despite having insurance, five Evangelical\u00a0 Covenant Churches in the Southeast Conference will suffer severe\u00a0 financial hardship as they have to\u00a0 pay deductibles on claims resulting\u00a0 from Hurricane Wilma, says Kurt Miericke, superintendent.<!--more--><\/p>\n<div>&#8220;Five churches really had a lot of damage,&#8221; says Miericke. &#8220;Even though\u00a0 all the churches were insured, the deductibles are very high for them.&#8221;\u00a0 The affected churches all are in Florida and Miericke listed the minimum\u00a0 amount that each church is going to have to pay:<\/div>\n<ul>\n<li>Faith Christian Center, Miami &#8211; $24,000<\/li>\n<li>Kingdom Covenant (formerly Palmetto), Miami &#8211; $7,000<\/li>\n<li>Bethany Covenant, North Miami \u2013 $10,000-plus<\/li>\n<li>Lighthouse Covenant, Tamarac &#8211; $14,000<\/li>\n<li>Royal Palm Covenant, Royal Palm Beach \u2013 $10,000 minimum<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Repair costs could eventually exceed $100,000 depending on what\u00a0 insurance ultimately covers, Miericke says. All of the churches had\u00a0 extensive roof damage that also allowed water damage to the interior.\u00a0 Bethany&#8217;s van also was stolen by looters shortly after the storm.<\/p>\n<div>The churches&#8217; financial struggles are worsened because many of the\u00a0 congregations&#8217; members also sustained major losses &#8211; and giving is down,\u00a0 Miericke says. &#8220;People are trying to regroup and restore themselves back\u00a0 to normal, but it is very costly.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;The people are weary,&#8221; Miericke continued, &#8220;especially Royal Palm\u00a0 because they had to rebuild last year. There&#8217;s a lot of fatigue. It&#8217;s\u00a0 put a lot of strain on every family.&#8221; Miericke says the hurricanes over\u00a0 the last two years have financially strained the conference as well.<\/div>\n<div>Other churches continue to provide support, however. A team from Vero\u00a0 Beach Covenant Church recently traveled to the Gulf Coast where they\u00a0 helped with cleaning. Central Carolina Community Church of Asheboro,\u00a0 North Carolina, traveled to Natchez, Mississippi, to restore a house &#8211;\u00a0 the house is adjacent to Greater Faith Tabernacle Covenant Church and\u00a0 storm victims who now attend the congregation live in the home. The\u00a0 Covenant Village Chapel Fund contributed $3,000 to the project.<\/div>\n<div>A team of eight people from First Covenant Church of Vero Beach,\u00a0 Florida, recently returned from a Thanksgiving week trip to Ocean\u00a0 Springs, Mississippi, where they helped clean homes. &#8220;People are still\u00a0 in desperate situations,&#8221; says pastor Tristan Hohler, who accompanied\u00a0 the group. &#8220;They&#8217;re living in trailers or they&#8217;re still waiting to live\u00a0 in trailers. There was some electrical and drywall work. Mostly it was\u00a0 knocking down stuff and tearing up carpet. We did a lot of sanitizing.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;One home had been submerged in 11 feet of water,&#8221; says team member Kim\u00a0 Baschak. &#8220;Half of it still had not been cleaned. Stuff was still wet\u00a0 from when hurricane hit.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>Workers used respirators and protective gear because of the mold and the\u00a0 toxicity of the mud that still exists in many homes. Much of the work\u00a0 was disgusting, but Hohler adds, &#8220;The rewards outweigh the mud.&#8221; Hohler\u00a0 describes the experience as &#8220;an unqualified blessing, especially after\u00a0 what we went through.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>First Covenant recently rededicated its building, which sustained severe\u00a0 hurricane damage in 2004. People from across the country had traveled\u00a0 help with repairs. One of them, Clyde Sundquist, of Minnesota, also traveled with the\u00a0 church on its mission to Mississippi.<\/div>\n<div>Baschak had never been to Vero Beach before, but the Portland, Oregon,\u00a0 resident joined the team after she learned on the Covenant&#8217;s website of\u00a0 the church&#8217;s rededication and its plans to help Katrina victims. &#8220;For me\u00a0 it was really humbling,&#8221; says Baschak. &#8220;It really caused me to reflect\u00a0 on my life and how I live it and having such deep appreciation and\u00a0 thanks for the things that can be destroyed and the things that can&#8217;t be\u00a0 destroyed.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;It also was really encouraging because some of the people we met had\u00a0 great hope,&#8221; Baschak observes. &#8220;I would have responded the same way.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>Working with people she had not previously known, including other\u00a0 volunteer groups from different denominations, had an impact on Baschak.\u00a0 &#8220;It reaffirmed for me the importance of the body of Christ,&#8221; she says.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;The people were grateful to the core,&#8221; says Hohler. People who were\u00a0 able, brought volunteers Thanksgiving dinners. One of the Covenant\u00a0 volunteers broke down in tears when a little girl gave him a handwritten\u00a0 note of thanks, Hohler adds.<\/div>\n<div>First Covenant coordinated its efforts through Christians Organized for\u00a0 Relief Efforts (CORE), which has set up a tent city that can accommodate\u00a0 about 200 volunteers on the property of a Methodist congregation.<\/div>\n<div>Hohler says he hopes Covenanters and others will continue to remember\u00a0 the storm victims and be reminded that recovery in Florida and the Gulf\u00a0 Coast will take years. &#8220;Everywhere we drove, everywhere we looked, there\u00a0 is still devastation. Many places aren&#8217;t even starting to rebuild. It&#8217;s\u00a0 still in preliminary stages.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>Covenanters have continued to donate to Covenant World Relief. So far,\u00a0 giving to Hurricane Katrina and other storm relief has reached $1.15\u00a0 million, with $59,000 given during November. So far $60,000 of that\u00a0 total &#8211; including $1,000 in November &#8211; has been donated online.<\/div>\n<div>There are two primary ways to donate to the Covenant&#8217;s Hurricane Relief\u00a0 Fund established by Covenant World Relief. Checks made payable to\u00a0 Covenant World Relief and earmarked for hurricane relief may be sent to\u00a0 Covenant World Relief, 5101 N. Francisco Avenue, Chicago, IL, 60625.\u00a0 Donations also may be made online using a major credit card at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.covenantbookstore.com\/hukarefun.html\">Covenant\u00a0 Hurricane Relief.<\/a> All online gifts will receive a charitable\u00a0 acknowledgement by mail for income tax purposes.<\/div>\n<div><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif\"> <\/span><\/div>\n<div>\n<div>Copyright \u00a9 2011 The Evangelical Covenant Church.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"wp-report-this\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/newswire?moderation_action=report_form&#038;object_type=post&#038;object_id=8189&#038;width=250&#038;height=300\" class=\"thickbox\" title=\"Report This Post\">Report This Post<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CHICAGO, IL (December 5, 2005)\u00a0 &#8211; Despite having insurance, five Evangelical\u00a0 Covenant Churches in the Southeast Conference will suffer severe\u00a0 financial hardship as they have to\u00a0 pay deductibles on claims resulting\u00a0 from Hurricane Wilma, says Kurt Miericke, superintendent. Report This Post<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Storm-Ravaged Churches Struggle with Deductibles - Covenant Newswire Archives<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/newswire\/2006\/12\/05\/4622\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Storm-Ravaged Churches Struggle with Deductibles - Covenant Newswire Archives\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"CHICAGO, IL (December 5, 2005)\u00a0 &#8211; Despite having insurance, five Evangelical\u00a0 Covenant Churches in the Southeast Conference will suffer severe\u00a0 financial hardship as they have to\u00a0 pay deductibles on claims resulting\u00a0 from Hurricane Wilma, says Kurt Miericke, superintendent. 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