UPDATE: On Thursday, July 10, Deaconess Kathy O'Day, director of LCC Disaster Response, and Denise Snider, director of LCC Human Care, will lead teams of volunteers in the Texas Hill Country to bring comfort, care, and support to LCMS churches, first responders, and community residents affected by the July 4 flash-flooding. Joining them will be Jason Johnson, Disaster Crisis Response and Volunteer Engagement Coordinator. 

​A team from Gloria Dei Houston will meet them there — with LERT-trained volunteers working with Deac. O'Day and Johnson, and Spiritual First Aid™- trained volunteers going with Snider.

Two K-9 Comfort Dog teams also will deploy Thursday evening:
- Team Elijah from Our Redeemer Wichita Falls, Texas, with Eddie Carlton (retired police) and Willie Reneau
- Team Joy from Gloria Dei Houston with Karen and Kim Gastler

The home base for ministry work this week will be at Hosanna Lutheran Kerrville.

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Lutheran Church Charities President/CEO Rev. Chris Singer announced Monday that LCC is planning to deploy to the Texas Hill Country to BE THERE to offer HOPE TO THE HURTING after catastrophic rains, rapid rises in river levels, and massive flash flooding overwhelmed multiple communities over the July 4 weekend. The tragic weather event took the lives of more than 100 people, including dozens of children at campgrounds along the Guadalupe River basin.

LCC has been invited by Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) Texas District President Rev. Dr. Jon Braunersreuther and Texas District Disaster Response Coordinators Julie Tucker and David Ricks as soon as it is safe to travel and perform much-needed ministry work.

“The scope of this disaster is massive, both in lives tragically lost and the wide area that has been impacted,” Rev. Singer said. “Our hearts are broken at the devastation. Lives have been upended and torn apart. We are praying fervently and eager to be on-site to help as soon as possible.”



Search and rescue operations continue with around-the-clock response from local, state, and national first responders. Hundreds of officers and support staff are working in Kerr County and the region northwest of San Antonio known for its rolling hills and winding rivers.

LCC staff — plus LCC volunteers in Texas and Oklahoma — are standing by to mobilize and travel to affected areas.



LCC is prepared to lend Disaster Response expertise and send LCC Care Teams trained in Spiritual First Aid™ to provide physical, emotional, and spiritual care to those affected by this ongoing tragedy.

With several roads and bridges washed out, travel around Kerrville and the surrounding region is limited. LCC is planning to send K-9 Comfort Dog and Hearts of Mercy & Compassion teams as soon as it can.

This week, LCC is focusing its assistance on serving the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) Texas District, plus working alongside LCMS pastors and congregations participating in community care efforts, including Kerrville, Boerne, San Antonio, and Houston. 

Rev. Singer has been in communication with LCMS district officials, while the directors from all four LCC ministry areas are talking daily with pastors in the region, assessing locations in the region to bring comfort and care.

Weather is another factor impacting deployment plans. The Texas Hill Country continues to see a pattern of rainstorms throughout the week.

Working with Hosanna Kerrville and other LCMS churches in the area, plus San Antonio and Austin, LCC is aggregating local resources to help residents, while preparing LCC volunteers when they arrive to help.

LCC can provide this assistance because of faithful, generous donors and volunteers who are willing to support and serve. 

“The financial support you can offer right now will go directly to helping families and LCMS congregations in the Texas Hill Country and bring HOPE TO THE HURTING,” Rev. Singer said. 

Hurts still linger a year after two fires and flash flooding ravaged the mountain community of Ruidoso, New Mexico.

“Today, emotions are all over the map,” said Melissa Moody, a Village of Ruidoso employee who works with the town’s Parks and Recreation Department. “Some are still shellshocked and struggling. Some are ready to move on. Some accept the consequences of living here. But all of us are coming together to be a stronger community.”

On Tuesday, Ruidoso paused to remember, reflect, and celebrate resilience a year after the 2024 natural disasters that took the lives of two people, destroyed 1,400 homes, and burned more than 25,000 acres. Hundreds of people from the community came to the town’s Wingfield Park for an event with the theme “United By Loss, Defined By Grit.”

Lutheran Church Charities was on hand to bring HOPE TO THE HURTING with the handlers of K-9 Comfort Dog Persis (King of Kings - Glenpool, Oklahoma) and K-9 Comfort Dog Elijah (Our Redeemer - Wichita Falls, Texas). The teams worked in conjunction with Rev. Jason Rust of Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Ruidoso and nine congregation members trained in Spiritual First Aid™.

The group also brought Hearts of Mercy & Compassion and crosses for the community to sign at the gathering. It marked the third visit by LCC staff and volunteers since the disaster — with previous trips focused on Disaster Response cleanup and Spiritual First Aid training.

“LCC is reaffirming its commitment to long-term care, healing, and hope for the people of Ruidoso,” said LCC President/CEO Rev. Chris Singer. “In the midst of despair and loss, we want this community to find the comfort, strength, and hope need for healing. LCC will continue to bring prayer, Scripture, and resources for Ruidoso and Shepherd of the Hills.

The day the South Fork Fire broke out, Melissa Moody didn’t think much of it. Fires happen in the New Mexico mountains from time to time.

When her boss called and told her to join the Emergency Operations Center, she delayed. She had to finish doing payroll.

Her boss called again, ordering her to the EOC, which had to evacuate three times as the wildfire spread.

In the days and weeks that followed, Moody operated Ruidoso’s mobile kitchen, feeding dozens of families, then a few hundred, and eventually 800 people three meals a day. Seven days a week for nearly a month.

“Those weeks are a blur,” Moody said while preparing for the remembrance event. “I didn’t see my family for three weeks.”

Ruidoso remembers, though.

As K-9 Comfort Dog teams for Persis and Elijah walked downtown the morning before the community event, shopkeepers and residents reflected on the fear and anxiety they felt during mandatory evacuations, subsequent flooding after the fires, and the devastation that was left behind. The mountains around the town still show treeless burn scars of where they fire raged.

“Encouragement is needed here.”

“Thank you for coming.”

“We’re glad you came.”

T-shirt vendors. Bar owners. Restaurant wait staff. All expressed a gratitude that people outside the community care and want to help.

Back at Wingfield Park, Moody listens as Rev. Singer shares a message of hope and spiritual encouragement with the community.

As a Village of Ruidoso admin who is back to selling fishing permits for the Parks & Rec Department, she sees something else.

“We’re going to be stronger because of this,” she said, looking over the crowd. “People still need help. They need support with finances and the essentials. But now they know that people care — and help is available. Your group is a big part of that.”

The anxiety and stress of the last day and a half was still overwhelming.

An armed man making threats, firing guns indiscriminately, and barricading himself in a house in a quiet neighborhood had thrust part of Fredonia, Wisconsin, into a 38-hour lockdown on Friday and Saturday, including St. John Lutheran Church just down the street. 

Even though the incident was over by Sunday morning, lingering trauma remained.

Joining them was a two-person LCC Care team of Parish Nurse Deb Hammen of Beautiful Savior Mequon, Wisconsin, and Cassandra Mammen of St. Paul Grafton, Wisconsin, both trained in administering Spiritual First Aid™. Each met with congregants and community members, assessing their emotional, physical, and spiritual needs and encouraging them to ease into a more relaxed frame of mind.

One moment stood out.

Becky Kilvinger, Top Dog for Charity Comfort Dog, noticed a woman with her head in her hands, seemingly overcome by distress.

“While greeting people before the second worship service, I noticed a church member grab a box of tissues and watched as the Pastor handed them to a woman,” Kilvinger recalled. “I asked [Pastor Frisque] if I could go over and say hello with Charity, and he agreed. We sat beside her, offered a hug, and she gently petted Charity. Charity then laid down at her feet. The woman was visibly distraught—sobbing, trembling, her face buried in her hands. We stayed with her through the entire service. She either looked at the cross or at Charity.”

Midway through the service, the woman’s grief and anxiety overwhelmed her.

“It was as if she had reached a point where she felt just safe enough to let go,” Kilvinger said. “We asked Deb, the Parish Nurse, to help her, and Deb guided her through breathing exercises saying, ‘Deep breath in, deep breath out. Look at the cross. You are here; you are safe.’” 

After the service, Kilvinger and Hammen sat with her, offered her food, and helped her get home safely.
“Before we left, she showed us photos of her family,” Kilvinger shared. “Her son passed away in October, and her husband died earlier this year. Her other son lives across the country. She’s endured unimaginable loss, now compounded by the recent traumatic events.”

Please lift Fredonia, Wisconsin, and St. John Lutheran Church up in your prayers as the community seeks peace in the coming days.

Help Us Be There When Crisis Strikes
When tragedy hits, LCC K-9 Comfort Dog teams and LCC Care Teams respond with the Mercy, Compassion, Presence, and Proclamation of Jesus Christ. In Fredonia, Wisconsin, they sat beside the grieving, comforted the anxious, and reminded a hurting community they were not alone.

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