HOST: This is Mike Osborne, host for the English language service of World Christian Broadcasting, a media ministry that transmits the gospel daily into Asia and down the Pacific Rim. Just days after killer tornados ravaged parts of the American Midwest, May 3^rd, I had the privilege of touring some of the most heavily damaged communities in Oklahoma. I say privileged because the people I met were a tremendous inspiration to me and I pray will be to you as well. For the next 30 minutes, World Christian Broadcasting brings you their stories from the heart of the storm. All of the survivors you will meet are from in and around Oklahoma City.

Our first story sounds surprisingly like the opening scene from the American movie, Twister. This story is all too real. Steve and Patti Ellis stood in the doorway of a neighbor’s storm cellar and watched the tornado’s progress.

STEVE ELLIS: We saw the storm change its direction and it started going extreme north which was in our direction. We began to hear the noise of the tornado coming our way. It sounded like a jet turbo engine and we were laying on the tarmac and it was getting ready to pour over us and it began to shake. We closed the door of the storm cellar and it had a large army strap on there that three men were holding on to as the tornado came over. It was shaking the door as it was so fierce. As the storm got directly over the storm cellar, it sucked all of the air outside of the storm cellar. It felt like your head was going to explode. It started taking off some of the plaster from inside the storm cellar. We thought the storm cellar was going to collapse. Then there was a loud crash – a tree or something had fallen over the storm cellar and then it became quiet. We tried to open the door, but there was too much weight on it. We waited about 20 minutes and then we heard people talking outside. We began to yell outside a couple of the air vents that were inside the storm cellar. Then the people came over and found one of the air vents and yelled down and asked if we were okay. We said, "We’re just fine, but there are some people down here very claustrophobic, we’re really ready to get out of here." They said they would get some help and do that. About 15-20 minutes later they came back and said, "Where is the door; where are you at?" There was so much rubble. We gave them the vicinity it was in and they started digging us out and about 15 minutes later we emerged to just extreme devastation.

HOST: The single wall of the Ellis home was all that remained standing after the storm. Patti says she has clearly witnessed God at work through the experience.

PATTI ELLIS: I think the first thing I saw was His hand of protection. I just knew that it was only by His grace that we lived through this situation. As the week progressed, we lost basically everything. I saw His hand of provision; we’ve lacked for nothing. Every time we’ve had a need, He’s been there and I’m so encouraged that our kids get to see God at work like this at an early age. I hope that He will use that in their lives.

HOST: Steve says he’s already seen evidence of just that very thing happening in the lives of his children.

STEVE ELLIS: I think every passage of scripture they have memorized over the last six months in school they began quoting just anything that would work and I think we all did. We really felt a sense that just God protected us. Our faith is not daunted; we’ve not questioned His sovereignty. We know that God is absolutely in control, even in these details here. We’re thankful to be alive, but it wasn’t our time. There is obviously something significant that God is preparing us and many other people that lived through this storm today.

 

The Cochran Family

HOST: As the killer storms bore down on Russ and Jeannie Cochran and their children, they watched television weather reports carefully and tried to decide whether or flee or ride out the storm at home.

RUSS COCHRAN: The particular station we were looking at changed the track of the storm to where it included more Dell City, Tinker Air Force Base, Midwest City which put us right in line for it. Probably about 15 minutes before it actually got to our neighborhood, the weather man said, "This is something you need to get below ground." But we don’t have a storm cellar in our area. I said, "Great! I have a shovel, but I don’t have near enough time to dig a hole deep enough to get us in it right now." Jeannie said, "If you think we need to leave, just tell me and I’ll gather some pictures or something and we’ll go." I said, "Get the pictures!" She grabbed a few pictures and we got in the car. I decided to go East on the interstate which was nearby our home to get out of the path of the storm.

HOST: Jeannie says they found their home nearly leveled when they returned just a few moments later.

JEANNIE COCHRAN: First of all it was very hard to find the house. When we got out of the car there were no landmarks, things that you look for when you are going down your street – no street signs, no trees. The trees that were there were on their sides with everything stripped off. It was real hard to recognize the trees. As a matter of fact, as we’ve gone back, I’ve gotten lost three times; I couldn’t find my street. We both immediately looked at the house and said, "Yea, well, okay." Russ went to the neighbor on the right to check on them and I went to the neighbor on the left to check on them. We came back and went through the house to see what was left. I haven’t felt devastated yet. There hasn’t been anything devastating about this to me. Now if I had not gotten the pictures out or one of us had gotten hurt, that would be totally different. It’s just stuff and we can replace stuff.

HOST: Russ says that one resource they couldn’t do without is their church family.

ROSS COCHRAN: The church has really become the church this week. It has just been tremendous at how God’s provision has worked through the church. We come up here, although we're just about two miles away from our actual church facility here. We know that a couple of times a day after digging around in the debris and rubble of our home, we can come up here and get a hot meal and see friends and familiar faces and friendly people that love us and care for us. They provide every need for us. Our son is wearing shoes today that came from here, from donations at the clothing closet. It’s given me a new appreciation for being involved in that type of ministry, to make sure that people’s needs are being met. I think back on the scripture where it says, where you have done this to the least of these you’ve done it also to me. That takes on new life.

HOST: In spite of the loss, Jeannie says there have been some silver lining of this dark cloud.

JEANNIE COCHRAN: Like I was telling you earlier, my heart is so full, I feel so blessed because of the friends we have and our church and what they have done for us. My daughter’s school has collected things for us. Russ’s work has collected things for us. Anything we need is here at the church; they will provide for us. I know they will.

 

The Volunteers

HOST: Following the May 3^rd tornadoes, a small army of volunteer relief workers moved into the devastated communities. Emma Parker directs the work of an emergency relief kitchen.

EMMA PARKER: At the beginning of the week we prepared sandwiches and would take them out into the field and feed anybody out there working. Now we’ve broken down to feeding the workers around this area and then if someone calls in an order, like the fire department called in for 100 meals last night, we prepared them and took it to them. That’s our function today, to prepare hot meals three times a day here for workers or supply any family with a hot box lunch they may need. They start coming in at 7:30 in the morning and we serve until 10:00 at night. If somebody comes in at 10:30 hungry, I will feed them. You can ask anybody around here, they know how I can keep going, but it’s God’s work. It’s where He wants me; it’s my gift.

HOST: Meredith and David Taylor are hard at work preparing hot meals for victims of the storm.

MEREDITH TAYLOR: This morning, I’m giving out juice and cereal and fruit cocktail.

DAVID TAYLOR: I’m the sausage cooker this morning. We’re retired. I retired out of the Federal Building downtown about six months before it blew up. I saw how much good was done for people then. We’ve been at this church congregation here for 40 years so we decided that we’ve got plenty of time to help, so we’re down here helping out this morning.

MEREDITH TAYLOR: Everyone that needs help and the way that God would want us to do is the reason I’m here.

HOST: With their sons playing at their feet, Andrew Leowsau and his wife work at sorting through a small mountain of donated clothing.

ANDREW LEOWSAU: Helping out as best we can as there are plenty of clothes out here that need to be sorted. I’m sure there are going to be more supplies that come in and just distributing them to those that need it. My family and I feel blessed that we’re able to have what we need and when it comes time to help others, it’s the love of God that helps us come out and help those that need help. Maybe some day it could be me.

HOST: Gary Parker helps stock food items for storm victims to choose from.

GARY PARKER: This is my first disaster, too. The first couple of days is a lot of confusion, but it’s coming together and we’re getting a lot of help. Yesterday on the truck, I had seven people on the list to help unload it, but 40 showed up. The good Lord definitely takes care of us. I learned over my life that if you do good works for Him and His name, you will never be without. I was an oil field worker for 21 years and lost my job. For the last six months every month when I’ve sat down, I’ve always had money to pay my bills. That right there really strengthens my faith.

HOST: Don Yoder is a truck driver from Angola, Indiana who filled his 18-wheeler with donated relief supplies and headed for Oklahoma. He had one box onboard that was extra special.

DON YODER: I had a box from a nine year old boy who with his own allowance went out and bought a box of supplies that he thought another nine year old boy would like. In it I’m assuming there is dog because in his letter that is enclosed he wanted me to read. It said that he really wanted to send a real dog, but my mommy said it might not be okay with your mommy. I promised them that I would try to find a nine year old that loved pets and see to it that he would get the box.

 

The Gentry Family

HOST: Tornadoes are a common occurrence on the American Great Plains, so Kevin Gentry rarely pays much attention to severe weather. But as Kevin watched the latest storms bare down on his community, he decided to put his children in the family car and flee the area.

KEVIN GENTRY: I was very blessed because I did something that was out of my nature and I know it was the Spirit moving me to draw me to safety. I give that glory to God. I know that if I stayed in there, we would be gone. It totally destroyed our house, the roof was completely taken off and the east and west walls of the house were gone and the front part of the wall. We had one wall on the outside that was intact, but the rest of it was pretty much gone. There is a big debris pile up on the garage. The girls’ room walls were knocked down into their room and then their wall went into our room. The hall where I usually put them had a lot of debris in there. I think they would have been okay and survived it, but I know they would have been injured. This is still kind of sinking in on me because I didn’t know what the damage was two or three or four streets over. It got worse every street south you went. There were people killed in those streets.

HOST: Kevin says that this tragedy and his faith have given him a different perspective on life and loss.

KEVIN GENTRY: This tornado won’t be the last thing. I know there is going to be more bad things and they are going to be hard to deal with. But I also know there is a transition in our life and it’s death. What I see right now, the physical, the flesh, the blood, is a temporary situation. At one point, God is going to pull me out of this vessel, my body, and I’m going to continue to live my life with Him. Knowing all that and knowing how Satan works, I have a different perspective on the bad things that happen to me and I know that Satan is out to destroy God’s children. God uses that to build and mature His flock. I know that every time something bad happens to me, it gives me a better understanding of God and how much He loves me. That’s just the opposite of what Satan wants it to do. All this devastation that’s gone on, it’s bad don’t get me wrong, it’s the physical. To me the real thing to be concerned about is the spiritual and the people that don’t have God as an anchor, their foundation, they’re devastated. They don’t have anything to fall back on. Nothing. If you don’t have God, Satan’s got you.

 

The Gilmore Family

HOST: Sandra Gilmore returned from her grandmother’s funeral to discover that the storm had destroyed her home. She described what she can see while standing on top of what was left of the house.

SANDRA GILMORE: Standing on what would have been the floor of my bedroom, and there’s of course no walls or anything left. All the kinds of stuff that you store in the attic is all piled over on the other side of the house kind of in a mess. There’s a bulldozer next door trying to bulldoze things to clear paths for the electric company. As far as you can see is devastation. There are very few houses that you see that are still intact. To the south you can see where the houses are still there, but when you look to the north there is nothing as far as you can see. I had a swimming pool in the back yard; it’s completely filled with debris. It is so filled up that you can’t tell where it is. We had two cars parked outside. We had moved them to the back yard and so there was my mother’s car and we had a little pickup that was in the back yard. Mother’s car is just smashed and in pretty bad shape. They’re going to try and tow it out. I didn’t realize until yesterday that there were no garage walls. The tree limbs and the debris and the roof debris and the pieces of people’s houses are just in piles and it reminds me of pictures I’ve seen of flood damage, but there’s no mud there. It’s just all this mess of stuff.

HOST: Sandra says that her faith has allowed her to accept the loss.

SANDRA GILMORE: I’m 57 and I feel like that it is the most important thing that I have. Throughout all of my life, I have relied on my faith to get me through any difficult time. I think when you have that already and something like this happens, it’s a whole lot easier to fall back on that. It’s not like you’re starting all over with a faith that you’ve never had before. It’s definitely gotten me through this. I think it’s easier to get things into perspective. You wonder why things like this happen, but then I also feel like that God was looking after us, too. I don’t question that part of it, I’m just thankful that we’re all safe. This is just stuff. Anything that I’ve lost can be replaced. I hate that some of my sentimental things are gone, but I’ve found some. It’s not like I don’t have anything at all and not dwell anything that I’ve lost. I do what I need to do and not worry about it because I know God will take care of it. He always has and always will.

 

The Crane Family

HOST: Evangelist, Jim Crane, and his Dell City church have been deeply involved in relief efforts. The church had nine families lose their homes altogether. And that many again suffered severe damage. The church has also reached out to the community, providing food and clothing. Crane says he’s been encouraged by the offers of assistance that the church has received in turn from others around the world.

JIM CRANE: Without a doubt, the outpouring of calls from literally all over the country and we’ve received e-mails all over the world as far away as Okanawa and Athens, Greece and calls from people who are acquainted with individuals here, have absolutely no knowledge whatsoever of anyone in this area that are saying, "What can we do? Can we come? Can we work? What do you need?" Perhaps the most touching to me was a telephone call I received the next day after the tornado from a youth minister in Littleton, Colorado, who had of course just gone through a horrible tragedy there. He said, "What can our youth group do to help you?" I thought, "Here is a group of people who have been just devastated in their community and received unbelievable attention in the media. But what they wanted to do was just reach out and help other people.

HOST: While the Crane’s suffered no storm damage themselves, the tornadoes did touch close to home.

JIM CRANE: The night that all of this hit, my 13 year old daughter as we were driving from home to the church building said, "Daddy, why did God do this?" When it hits you at home that close, I said, "God didn’t do this. You have to understand that Satan is at work in this world. God still loves us and God still cares and there are natural disasters and there are natural forces of nature that take place and this is not God punishing us, it’s just a reality."

 

Ross Portavude

HOST: Ross Portavude is Iranian born, but has lived in the U.S. for more than two decades, long enough to become used to the many Spring storms that rumble across the American heartland.

ROSS PORTAVUDE: I saw some baseball sized hail that with my experience in the United States and in Oklahoma, particularly, in 22 years I’ve never seen any hail of that size before. When a couple of them hit my glass, I knew this was different. I just very calmly got up from the Lazyboy and I started walking toward the master bedroom. On the king size bed I got two pillows and went to the master bedroom closet door and opened the door. I went inside there and put the pillows on top of my head. With one hand I closed the door of the closet. I kid you not, at that time the dance began. As soon as I got there, the dance began.

HOST: The dance that Ross speaks of was an F-5 tornado tearing through the neighborhood inflicting tremendous damage.

ROSS PORTAVUDE: I could hear a train coming through because of the wind. Glass objects flying everywhere. The roof caved in. Lumbers and bricks were hitting the walls. One of the walls of the closet was an outside wall. Within the first 15 seconds, I was okay, the wall was not going in and out. But after another 10-15 seconds, the wall was like a balloon, going in and out against my shoulder, as if it was breathing. I was going against it. I knew at that time it wasn’t my power that was holding this wall. It was Jesus Christ in me. I said, "God, Father you know I’m ready if it is my time. If it is your purpose, let it be implemented. Don’t blind me, don’t cripple me, just take me, I’m ready." By the time I said this, I gave Him my children, I called them by name. I said, "You take care of my little Ross. You take care of my daughter, Kristin. You take care of my wife dear Lord. In your strong hands I give these three to you. If this is my time, take me."

HOST: As Ross finished his prayer, a great peace came over him, and soon the storm subsided. His home was nearly flattened, but Ross left that closet without a single scratch.

ROSS PORTAVUDE: By all physical laws, I should have been dead. As soon as I walked out on the west side of wall I saw no houses. Wiped off, completely flattened houses. You could have seen them, a little bit of lumber here and there, but that was it. A lady was screaming, "My mom and dad." That was Bob’s daughter, our neighbor. We went and rescued mom and dad. Another gentlemen with a puppy across the street from me was under his cellar bleeding everywhere. I realized that after we rescued him, there was a Hispanic lying on the street. I didn’t know she was dead until I went and tried to wake her up. I thought maybe she passed out, but she was cold dead.

HOST: As Ross moved on to help other neighbors, he noticed that the air was thick with the smell of natural gas leaking from hundreds of broken pipes. A single spark could have easily destroyed what little the tornado had left.

ROSS PORTAVUDE: A gentleman came maybe two or three houses down from me. He was considered violent, but he was so nervous that he was going to start smoking. I just screamed at him. I said, "Gentlemen, sir, please do not smoke. Don’t you smell the gas? The gas was everywhere." He just realized it. By the grace of God I was alert about these things. If he would have lit up his cigarette we all would have been gone. He realized it. He apologized. He broke his cigarette and went on.

 

The Tom Ellis Family

HOST: Evangelist, Tom Ellis, saw his home destroyed by the May 3^rd tornado, the second home he’d lost in less than a year.

TOM ELLIS: As far as I’m concerned, compared to most people we suffered very little. In February this year, my wife and I were visiting with our daughter and son-in-law and children who are missionaries in Cambodia. We received news that our house had burned down. It was the Lord’s house and the Lord’s stuff. In subsequent weeks we found a temporary dwelling place, a little patio home over near our house and begin to set up shop there. We just didn’t realize how temporary it was. Now, being right in the path of this tornado, we can certainly see the effects of what we lost again. The truth of the matter is our losses are very small. Frankly, you rejoice in the Lord and that’s a choice that a person makes. My wife and I talk about this. We see deeper purposes in this. It certainly has given us an element of credibility with our church family as many people have lost their homes. I’m able to sit down with them and say, "I know a little bit of what you feel and I can identify with you. How can I help you?" Really it’s a very small price to pay for an enormous amount of credibility at this moment.

HOST: Ellis says as they clean up and rebuilding continues, he’ll encourage his church family to learn a larger lesson from the storm.

TOM ELLIS: Over against the massive relief efforts in which we have been engaged, I’m hoping to point out the fact that there are bigger catastrophes around us. We’ve been involved in trying to help people who have lost houses. All along people have been losing homes. They’ve been losing their children, their husbands, their wives, their moral integrity. They’ve been losing their peace with God and the challenge is one to lift our eyes up to the larger issues at stake and let this be a wake up call. We need to mount the same kind of determined, vital effort to reach people who are without Christ and eternally lost.

Would you like to return to the IWitness transcript page, or would you like to return to list of all transcripts?

The New Life Station is pleased to provide transcripts online for a number of KNLS programs.  Please note that all scripts are the property of World Christian Broadcasting and/or SeedSower Productions.  They are provided here for your personal enjoyment only and may not be disseminated in any fashion without prior written permission.

                     KNLS International, © 2001 - Mike Osborne webmaster