Transcript by Greta Gerstener

Rachel: South Louisiana. We sit on the edge of the Gulf watching the waters rise, getting hotter, wetter, colder, and drier in the blink of an eye, our streets flood so badly we can't get to school or work, and we've lost another football field's worth of wetlands. But the exciting news is that everywhere you look, we are adapting. Figuring out how to rise with the water plan better and listen to nature. I'm your host Rachel Nederveld, and this is No Matter the Water, a series of interviews with neighbors across the region who are figuring out how to live with our unpredictable weather.

One of the biggest themes in this series is community. Our communities are what make us wanna stay. They're how we get through disaster aftermath, and they're what's gonna help us figure out how to live with nature. And church communities are some of the best equipped to lead that challenge.

Rev Harris: Let me see I gotta find the keyÉ Alright, here we go. You're in the main sanctuary of the church, yes, you're in the main sanctuary of the church. This is where we have service at Sunday mornings. I'm James Harris

Rachel: Reverend James Harris

Rev Harris: My grandfather, my dad's father was a pastor. Both of my sons are in the ministry. My oldest sister's son is actually a preacher, so it kind of runs around in the family pretty good, you know, we kind of infested with preachers.

Rachel: Reverend Harris has been a pastor for 40 years and for more than half of that career, he's led the church we're sitting in.

Rev Harris: Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church of DeQuincy

Rachel: DeQuincy, Louisiana. A small town about nine miles northwest of Lake Charles.

Rev Harris: I grew up here, DeQuincy in the predominantly black community, and it was like one big family. All those people were like parents to you and so forth and so on. So it was a village then and it still has some of that today. You tend to know most people and you get a lot of smiles, a lot of speaking and stuff like that in the communities. It's a pretty quiet little town. It's very nice. I think there's only one grocery store or market, Few things, but not, not a whole lot.

Rachel: But plenty of churches.

Rev Harris: It's a Methodist church and then the next church up the road is a church of Garden Christ and then there's another Baptist church sitting back in the neighborhood and another church of Garden Christ sitting back in the neighborhood there, so we got plenty of churches. This Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church, this is the oldest church in the black community. It's like 104 or 105 years old, it's been there a long time. And actually the street that we are on is Evergreen Baptist Lane. The name was changed on it when the church made the hundred year anniversary, so that was a good year.

Rachel: In your early days here, what kind of service was the church focusing on for the community?

Rev Harris: The church has always fullback in my opinion, has always some type of benevolent type program where they would help people with whatever their needs might be, whether it was utility bills, whether it was grocery, whether it was medical bills. Sometimes we are thought of as the community church because we do things for people that are not members of the church, for example, we'll do a family person, not a member. We reach out to that family and show 'em some love and so forth and so on. It's old Evergreen Baptist Church, we're just here for you, You know.

Rachel: Whether it's funerals, scholarships, or disaster preparedness.

Rev Harris: I think being prepared is a crucial thing. I do a lot of talking about being prepared to evacuate.

Rachel: Everyone who grows up down here has developed some kind of hurricane preparedness skills, but not everyone's a natural at disaster preparedness.

Rev Harris: I think I'm somewhat, I call it an anticipator. Spent eight years in the US Air Force after high school. I spent three years, I think it was in, a mobile communication group in the Air Force, and you had to keep a bag packed all the time.

Rachel: A go bag.

Rev Harris: Yeah. Yeah. 'cause when you got the call to move, you had just a very short amount of time to be on the base and ready to go, and you had to go with what you had. You know, so you kept a, kept a bag so you don't have to get ready, you stay ready. When my wife and I got married, she laughed, I told her don't fool with that bag. Nothing comes out Ôcause if you had to go, you had to, you know, if you left and you didn't have your toothbrush, you ain't toothbrush, you know?

Rachel: And he still keeps a go bag.

Rev Harris: ItÕs actually a backpack. I have a what if mindset, can I move in a hurry? Can I, can I do something in a hurry? So I usually keep a backpack with stuff in it, that if I could grab it and go, I know that, some clothes in it. In fact, I don't know if I told you, I usually got some Vienna sausages or some tuna fish or something in it too. And I, I, I suggest that for people in a sense, to have a plan to make a quick move if you have to 'cause you just never know, you just never know.

Rachel: This is the type of thing that Reverend Harris started including in some of his preaching. I have a go bag and you should too.

Rev Harris: I do a lot of talking about having some supplies. I even encouraged to have funds available. You know, put your little something to stay prepared to evacuate, because I think when we go to the point that it's a mandatory evacuation, I encourage people to evacuate. You can always come back, you know, you can always, come back because it's, it's unfair, I guess I would say, to stay and find yourself in trouble and have an expectation of others to risk their life, to try to rescue you, you know? So I encourage us to evacuate.

Rachel: Hurricanes, mandatory evacuations, storm damage repairs. This is all just part of what it means to live in Louisiana, which also means it's a part of Reverend Harris's ministry. He has taken it upon himself to make sure his DeQuincy neighbors are as prepared as they can be, regardless of whether they go to his church.

Rev Harris: We work the village, yeah, our congregation worked the village, you know, we get out amongst the people, you know. We get pretty active in trying to make sure that everybody is okay. We have a list of the senior citizens that's by they selves and different things like that, and when we start getting the warning, then we have a tendency to visit people and see if they're okay. Are you prepared to leave? Can you leave? Are you gonna need some gas money, you know, to make sure that people can evacuate. And I think because I'm a native at DeQuincy, you know, many of the older people, like I said, it was a village. Many of the older people were like parents to me. I think when I first started pastoring here, we had four or five of my elementary school teachers. Yeah, so try that.

Rachel: Did they remember you?

Rev Harris: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Rachel: How did they remember you? Were we the class clown?

Rev Harris: Yes. How'd you know that?

Rachel: Just stab. Just a stab in the dark.

Rev Harris: Yeah. Yeah.

Rachel: To help prepare for storms, the Evergreen congregation goes door to door, holds community meetings, and talks to churchgoers and neighbors. They also make phone calls and use social media to check on people and help spread the word. One of his sons manages the church's Facebook page.

Rev Harris: He'll send a message out Facebook and we get information out like that a lot too.

Rachel: In 2020, hurricane Laura was heading their way. So as always, the church looked around to see what they could do to help their community prepare.

Rev Harris: There was some concern about people that was in, I'm gonna say substandard housing, trailers, whatever like that. So there was an issue with us being a shelter because of insurance purposes and stuff like that. But we did make it available as a shelter. You know, of course they could sleep on air mattresses or whatever the case may be, and had access to the bathrooms and that kind of stuff.

Rachel: DeQuincy was hit hard by Laura, Evergreen Missionary Baptist included.

Rev Harris: We lost the roof off the church, so we were not able to have service in the facility here. As I listened to people saying their churches was damaged, I took a different twist. I said the church wasn't damaged, it was just the building. So the church kept meeting and we kept having church in the parking lot. It was awesome, you know, and you could just pull up and park in the parking lot and we had somebody out there kind of helping direct the cars, the sound people put together a sound system that we used outside and we just, just go out there and people just pull up and park in their cars. And some people would stand inside their car and stuff like that, and we'd just have a regular church service, you know?

Rachel: So it was like a drive-in movie theater.

Rev Harris: Yeah. Except everybody didn't have a speaker to hang on their car.

Rachel: How did it feel whenever you guys were doing the services in the parking lot?

Rev Harris: Honestly, I, I felt good about it. I would look out there and you would see people that, you had not seen inside the building, but they were parked out there, people came.

Rachel: Are there any specific scriptures that you find are helpful or relatable or?

Rev Harris: I visit some scripture quite often, you know, in preaching and so forth and so on, that actually deals with how we can trust God. Even simple scripture that we were very familiar with, like the Lord is my shepherd, 23rd Psalm, you know, or so forth, so on, and that's the Lord is my shepherd, you know? And he will take care of me, He will provide my needs, you know, but you gotta see God's guidance. I deal with the fact that you've got the want God to guide you. There was a time when the disciples was out on the sea and the storm arose and so forth, and Jesus was in the back of the boat sleeping. And they panicked and so forth and so on and they got, I'm gonna say a little angry with him down there asleep. We about to die out here, you know, and he came up and spoke to the to the storm, I'm gonna say and quieten it down and everything, you know what I'm talking about. And then he say, oh, ye of little faith, and I'll use a scripture like that, oh, ye of, of, of little faith, trust God.

Rachel: Are there any sermons that stick out? Maybe one before, after a storm or just in general when you're talking about what's happening around the weather here?

Rev Harris: I think I did a sermon that deals with, upon this rock I built my church in the gates of hell should not prevail against my church. So one of the little sayings that I had, and I tend to put a little humor in things, that's just my nature you know. I think I was saying something like, Jesus says the gates of hell won't prevail against his church, I guarantee you the hurricane won't.

You can almost kind of see it on here, one of the things that's done is to prevent water from getting in your house. The more you can do that, the less damage it's gonna be to your house. If you notice, we got this tape here on the seams of this plywood, that you do lose your, your shingles and stuff like that, it keeps water from getting in the house.

Rachel: Reverend Harris and I are in the church parking lot. We're standing next to a small structure about six feet high that looks like a miniature porch. But this structure's all about the roof, which is designed to be more weather resistant and serves as a hands-on example for people who wanna learn how to build them.

Rev Harris: All this is about being able to withstand the wind, which in turns prevent water getting into your house.

Rachel: This is just one of the ways Evergreen helps people, not just prepare for, but recover from a storm.

Rev Harris: We're gonna open the door here and go into our tool library. You can come out and sign out painting gear, small air compression, various things. We do have some supplies like caulking and stuff like that that's in here. And in a given situation, of course we would beef it up a little bit and have more stuff that you might need to do stuff with. We do have some tops back here in the back, so if you need to top to get your house topped up.

Rachel: The Tool Library is a free community resource for anyone that needs access to the various tools the church has on hand.

Rev Harris: Laura was definitely a turning point for our church because of the major devastation in our area. So we felt that we needed to do something to bring those resources to the people here in this community. Our hope is that we can pass it around through the community. You know, you check it out, you use it today, you bring it back, or whatever the case may be.

Rachel: The church also distributes educational flyers and pamphlets throughout the community at city hall, at the corner store, and of course the church...

Rev Harris: High wind protection, then we deal with a roof in the right way, elevating your home, flood resistance, mold and moisture, and setting priorities.

Rachel: When Reverend Harris thinks about how to guide people through these disasters, he's thinking about the practical prep and recovery, but the foundation to all these practical measures is a spiritual faith.

Rev Harris: Spiritually, it's very, very, very important so that you'll be able to mentally, psychologically deal with whatever outcome is. One of the, the, the major things I was shown and talk about is bowing to the sovereignty of God. God is in absolute control and I usually say life gets much better when we accept the sovereignty of God. So do what we can and don't stress yourself about those things that you can't do. And that's pretty challenging sometimes, you know what I'm talking about. I realize that 'cause it can be depressing, it could be hard when you lose everything. If you don't get destroyed with it, you can build another one. But if you get destroyed with it, you know, it's just, it's hard to recover psychologically and emotionally and stuff like that, you know. We have to understand that there are things that hurt, but don't let it be so devastating to you that it destroy you, that make you distraught. Because of all of the material things, you know, can be replaced. If you see it as just everything's wiped out, then I have no hope, no way out. It could be more devastating for you. So come back to that same question, you know. Okay, God, this is where it is. What would you have me do now economically, I can't come back and build a house that I had, but can I come back and build a small house? Can I, can I clear my lot off and put a trailer on? So I, I try to get us to understand that we've gotta be detached to some degree from that type of stuff. If we going to do well when we experience it and realizing that we live in an area that is prone for that to happen is even more critical.

Rachel: So you counsel a lot of other people. Can you just put into words specifically how you cope with those emotions? Or how you handle them and work through them?

Rev Harris: I think there are times perhaps when I'm challenged because, sometimes when you, you're working with a person and they just can't grab it, you know, and you just wanna open 'em up and pull it in, so to speak. So I, I think it's sometimes a little bit draining, but I'm very grateful for, for my wife Linda Banks Harris, married for the past 50 years. We actually did high school together. She's good at helping me through moments like that, sometimes she don't even know it, you know what I'm talking about. She's helping me through it and now that I have grown children, they're the same. Just like both of them being in the ministry, they can relate. So thank God that I have those avenues. I have a tendency to steal away and spend, I call it quality time with God. You might find me parked in a park or just walking in a park somewhere in the serenity. You know, or, or I got some little spots, kind of more or less kind of in the woods that I go, just get away and let God speak to me.

Rachel: Have you noticed a difference in like your congregation and community being more prepared as you've been providing more of these resources?

Rev Harris: I think by being able to discuss being prepared, I think our congregation is now better prepared. That's from communicating with different ones in our congregation and stuff like and that many of 'em will tell you they're prepared to do this, they're prepared to do this. They, some of 'em tell you they keep their car full of gas and all that kind of stuff, and they've made arrangements with family or friends other places, and they have an idea of where they're going to go when they evacuate and they, they got some stuff together. They got, they got, it's a go bag of some sort.

Rachel: And if a go bag is all they've got, Reverend Harris knows he got through a little bit.

Rev Harris: You know the reason I'm laughing, my wife saw it, this morning, she said, what the go bag doing out? But the other day we went somewhere and I just threw it in the car. ÔCause I know it's enough stuff in that, you know, clothes or whatever. Well, we go, just threw it in the car, so it was kind of still out of place, and now just this morning, say what that throw out.

Rachel: Do you have stuff for your wife in there?

Rev Harris: Ain't nothing for my wife here, she knows it. Yeah. Yeah. I have some stuff.

Rachel: No figures.

Rev Harris: Focus on this community. Amen. We want even those that perhaps don't know the Lord as they say that by the impact we have on the community. Now mind your mind, you listen closely I didn't say in this building, I said the impact that we have on the community. After we come here to fuel up, we go out to serve.
Amen.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got Jesus. Jesus, Jesus.

Rachel: Thank you for listening to this episode of No Matter the Water, which was produced by Rachel Nederveld and Associate Produced by Jillian Godshall
Production support and story editing by Laine Kaplan Levinson with editing help from Theo Balcomb
The sound engineers for this episode were Jeremy Gegenheimer and Rachel Nederveld / and Aaron Thomas did the Sound Design & Mix
Our music is by Richard Revue and Cover Art by MakeMade
Thanks so much to Mary Tiznaud, our guest Reverend Harris, and to everyone who has helped make this project possible
A special shout out to The Current for their support, especially Christiaan Mader and Johanna Divine
You can learn more about the topics in this episode and hear the rest of the series at nomatterthewater.comÊÊ
Funding for this project has been provided in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, South Arts, Acadiana Center for the Arts, the Louisiana Division of the Arts,Ê Lafayette Economic Development Authority, the State of Louisiana, Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities and ArtSpark
No matter the water is a production of Ga De Don and The Current Media