I didn’t want to write this. I still don’t.
The push notification lit up my phone while I was working out — campers swept away as the Guadalupe River surged dozens of feet in under an hour. I walked out of the gym and teared up in my truck.
Now I’m stuffing sunscreen and swimsuits into two trunks. My older two kids head off to sleepaway camp next week. How do I tell them the adventure they’re so giddy about just turned fatal for other families? What can a keyboard jockey like me offer when other parents are living a nightmare? My first instinct was to close the laptop, whisper a prayer, and stay quiet.
But silence isn’t always the faithful response.
Entire campsites — from Kerr County to the back roads of Texas Hill Country — have been wiped away. Parents who expected mosquito bites and ghost stories are now scanning riverbanks for anything recognizable. They don’t need punditry. They need the rest of us to witness their grief without turning it into the next battleground in the culture war.
That’s the part I dread most.
Within hours of the first siren, the internet erupted in blame. Was it climate change? Outdated flood maps? Local negligence? Federal failure? Pick your camp, rack up your retweets, move the score marker. The bodies weren’t even identified before the hashtags started trending. It’s as if we’ve forgotten how to mourn without also trying to win.
‘Where was God?’ feels like the only honest question when the water rises. But storms don’t mean vengeance, any more than sunsets are God’s apology.
Then there’s that phrase believers lean on — “thoughts and prayers.” “Ts and Ps,” as Gen Z sneers. If I lost one of my kids, those words would feel like a whispered lullaby in a room suddenly emptied of breath — tender, well-meaning, and painfully inadequate.
Not because prayer is pointless. Because the cliché is.
When calamity struck, Job’s friends “sat with him on the ground seven days … and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.” No carbon emissions debate. No X threads. Just presence. Silence. Solidarity.
Maybe that’s the posture we need now — especially along a river whose name, Guadalupe, traces back to “river of the wolf.” Creation still has teeth. Even waters we picnic beside can turn predator in a single thunderstorm. Wolves hunt in packs. They also protect their own. Maybe that’s the symbolism: The same river that devoured so many calls the rest of us to move as a pack — toward the survivors, not away.
Real faith doesn’t show up as a hashtag. It comes in the form of casseroles and chain saws, spare bedrooms and Venmo links. It hauls soggy photo albums into the sun. It listens more than it lectures. When Jesus met Mary and Martha at the tomb, He wept before He preached. Maybe that’s the order we’ve lost.
Photo by Jim Vondruska/Getty Images
So what can we do from a distance?
Give until it pinches — money, blood, bottled water, even unused PTO if your workplace allows donations. Relief crews will need support for months, not days.
Go if you can. Student ministries, church groups, skilled contractors — this work doesn’t end when the cameras leave.
Guard these families’ dignity. Share verified donation links, not drone footage of recovered bodies. If you wouldn’t show the image to your child, don’t post it.
Grieve aloud. Let your kids see adults who don’t numb tragedy with mindless scrolling.
And yes, pray — not as a substitute for action, but as its source. Prayer is oxygen for those on their feet. When the apostle James said, “Faith without works is dead,” he might as well have been looking out the window of a rescue chopper.
I get the temptation to shake a fist at heaven. “Where was God?” feels like the only honest question when the water rises. But storms don’t mean vengeance, any more than sunsets are God’s apology. Scripture calls Him a refuge and redeemer, not a puppet master yanking strings to break hearts. Turning away from God now is like fleeing the only lighthouse in a gale.
If grief makes prayer sound hollow, answer the hollowness with action — and with the stubborn belief that the Creator remains good, even when creation feels cruel.
I still don’t want to write this. I’d rather tuck my kids in tonight and pretend rivers respect property lines and holiday weekends. But if this piece offers anything, let it give permission to mourn without politicizing. For one day — one hour even — let grief be grief. Let dads hold their kids tighter. Let moms remind us that safety doesn’t come with a zip code. Let the church prove it’s more than a Sunday address.
With the sparklers of Independence Day barely cooled, maybe the most patriotic thing we can do is recover the lost art of compassionate presence. No monologue — including this one — can fill a bunk bed left empty. But through gifts, sweat, silence, and prayer, maybe we can shoulder a sliver of the weight.
If you’re reading this in a dry living room, remember the families whose furniture is floating somewhere downriver.
Before you post, pause.
Before you debate, donate.
If “thoughts and prayers” still feel hollow, add two more words: “Here’s how.”
Then go do it.
