Louisville—Kentucky Baptists Disaster Relief teams are working in Louisiana where widespread flooding has claimed four lives and damaged nearly 5,000 homes.

About 30 volunteers leave Thursday for Farmerville located in north central Louisiana on Lake D’Arbonne. The lake crested nearly nine feet above normal flooding nearby businesses and homes.

Kentucky Baptist DR Director Coy Webb said the volunteers are helping local residents clean up muddy, water-logged homes.

“Many of these folks don’t have flood insurance and, right now, their world seems pretty bleak,” Webb said. “We want to show them someone cares and that someone is Jesus Christ.”

The Kentucky Baptist volunteers are will be part of a statewide disaster relief effort coordinated by the Southern Baptist Disaster Relief, a division of the North American Mission Board. The volunteers are expected to return March 26.

A line of thunderstorms that hit parts of Oklahoma, Arkansas, northern Louisiana and northern Mississippi on Sunday, March 13, might “aggravate the flooding situation,” said Davyon Hill, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Shreveport.

The U.S. National Guard reported that day, more than 3,300 people and 316 pets had been rescued since flooding began. (KBC)