Elohim Shomri

Elohim Shomri: God is my protector

Wow. So so much has happened since my last blog! To start we journeyed as a squad to Black Mountain, North Carolina last monday for a week of domestic ministry! We were working with Excel College which is led by former WR alumni and we were doing various projects throughout Asheville and Black Mountain. Some of my squadmates were doing evangelism in downtown Asheville and some of us were doing yard work and landscaping around the college campus and at the children’s home where we were staying. The first few days were going well, working at a thrift store and building relationships with those at Excel college and building unity on our squad. Thursday night we got word our ministry was canceled because of excessive amounts of rain coming our way so we were planning on having a chill day on friday. Thursday night falling asleep was hard because of the amount of rain and wind hitting our cabins, but i eventually fell asleep.

The next morning, we were woken up by the guy who was managing the cabins we were staying in, he told us to grab our things and move to the dining hall because it would be safer there to prevent flooding. So I grabbed my toiletry bag, my Bible, journal, pen, A few clothing items and headed towards the Dining hall. I sent my dad a voice memo that morning saying we were fine and safe and not to worry. I sent that voice memo from the bathroom at 8:30. We noticed some rain and flooding starting to happen behind our building around nine. We had a squad meeting of 36 of us in the center of the dining hall where we were told we were in the safest place possible and to not go in the back room anymore because of the flooding. At 9:10 am one of my squad mates told us a tree was falling and we needed to move. I was laying on the ground, dove and covered my head with a backpack as a landslide hit the building that all 36 of my teammates were in. Everyone ran out of the building as it was flooding, people were screaming and crying. I grabbed my backpack and ran out as well. We had to run through 3 feet of mud to make it to safety, but safety still wasn’t safe. We were on a concrete area, where the vans were parked. There was no way out, we called 911 and they didn’t answer. But we were all outside of the building safe and only my leader hurt her ankle. We were instructed to wait for an hour before we would be rescued. We all called our parents explaining what happened, we were scared because we didn’t know how we were gonna be rescued and what was going to happen next. The wind would blow, and we would all run in fear that more trees would fall. Eventually, the guys in charger guys made a rope across the flash flood and two by two we made our way to safety. We went to the brick building and they had clothes and food for us. A relief team from world race came up to us and brought supplies and we’re trying to figure out a way to get us home. At 10 o’clock that night we were instructed to move to a holiday Inn in downtown Asheville because there was a gas leak close to where we were. Some men from the hotel volunteered to take us there. Once we got to the hotel, we stayed in a conference room and slept there that night and then the next morning someone’s dad drove through the night to get to us, and we were safely taken back to base in Gainesville.

People lost clothes, shoes, backpacks, passports, phones, money, and in that moment We realized how lucky we were just to be alive. out of 36 of us in one building no one was crushed, if anyone would’ve been in the bathroom they would’ve died. The building we were in was half destroyed, but no one was hurt. God saved us. The cabins we were sleeping in were completely destroyed. I saw an after picture some guys took who worked at the college and the bed I was in was completely taken down by a tree. If the guy wouldn’t have woken us up we would be dead right now. GOD IS SO GOOD. He is not done with my squad.

This is the short version of the story, but God is such a protector. The facts that we made it out of North Carolina so quickly and safely is crazy because asheville is now destroyed! We are so lucky, but now the town needs to be rebuilt so we need to keep Western North Carolina in our prayers. Keep Excel in your prayers. Keep Black Mountain Home for children (where we stayed) in your prayers.

I learned that God is not done with my squad, he has a plan for all of us! He is going to use us in marvelous ways!

Our parents got to come and visit us after the flood to comfort us. We will all be doing therapy to make sure we are all good. No one on my squad is leaving, we are all choosing to press on for the kingdom and complete this journey. In 24 hours we raised $30,000 to replace our items we lost and we will still be going to Guatemala on Monday! God is good.

As we move forward we will not live in the “if” world. We won’t dwell on the fact that we could have died, we will dwell on the fact that God saved us and we are alive and have an amazing testimony to Gods goodness.

Thank you so much for all the prayers. In the moment we had people praying for us all over the world, multiple people woke up in the middle of the night and said they felt like they needed to pray for us, we had prayer warriors for us throughout the whole thing and their is POWER IN PRAYER! I was showered in prayers and so many friends and family reached out which was such a blessing and I felt so so loved throughout all of this, so thank you so much!

Please Pray for us as we travel to Guatemala and start ministry in just a few days!

Love and Miss you all!

Jackson Schlesinger

*If you have any further questions about specific details feel free to call or text me

Photo Time!

Pre Landslide:

Pickleball and Chicken Wings!