Chester pastor returns from volunteer wildfire relief in California
CHESTER, Va. (WRIC) -- Corey Baker, a Chester pastor and Red Cross volunteer who flew out to California to help with wildfire recovery efforts, is back in Central Virginia. 8News introduced viewers to Baker back in January when he first arrived. Today, he’s settling back in at home in Colonial Heights, but he remembers the work he did and what he saw out west. “Nothing but ashes," Baker said. “Homes lost, families displaced. The communities that- they were just demolished.” Baker has been the pastor at Healing Hearts Ministries in Chester for the last 14 years, and a Red Cross volunteer for the last 20 -- the disaster relief organization focused on minimizing any human suffering after disaster. While the Eaton and Palisades fires were still engulfing parts of Los Angeles, Baker flew to the Palisades, where he’d spend the next two weeks providing spiritual guidance. He also went to Hawaii in 2023 after wildfires raged through communities there, but said the only way he could try to prepare was by praying and fasting. “Honestly, you could never be prepared for what you could see," he said. “Day to day, it was always something different.” Baker said he worked 14 hour days serving food and water at a shelter housing 700 people, getting people away from active fires and even going with first responders to neighborhoods that turned to ash. The Palisades and Eaton wildfires ended up burning more than 37,000 acres. “There were no neighborhoods," he said. But he said most of the relief came from being an open ear. “Everybody [has] different faith, so spiritually, it’s more like a brotherly love that I carry there with me," he said. "In a conversation, sometimes I do all the talking. A lot of times I do all the listening.” He said one conversation that stands out to him the most was with a woman who inherited her now burned down home. Baker said it had been bought decades before at a much lower cost than it would be today, and that she didn't know if she’d ever fully recover. Still, he was moved by the people’s strength. “They had such a resilience, you know, they were just getting back up and ready to rebuild," he said. “People can live 30 days without food. Three days without water. But not three seconds without hope.” Baker is now home and looking for a bigger space to expand his church, but hopes to visit the Palisades again in the future.
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CHESTER, Va. (WRIC) -- Corey Baker, a Chester pastor and Red Cross volunteer who flew out to California to help with wildfire recovery efforts, is back in Central Virginia. 8News introduced viewers to Baker back in January when he first arrived.
Today, he’s settling back in at home in Colonial Heights, but he remembers the work he did and what he saw out west.
“Nothing but ashes," Baker said. “Homes lost, families displaced. The communities that- they were just demolished.”
Baker has been the pastor at Healing Hearts Ministries in Chester for the last 14 years, and a Red Cross volunteer for the last 20 -- the disaster relief organization focused on minimizing any human suffering after disaster.
While the Eaton and Palisades fires were still engulfing parts of Los Angeles, Baker flew to the Palisades, where he’d spend the next two weeks providing spiritual guidance. He also went to Hawaii in 2023 after wildfires raged through communities there, but said the only way he could try to prepare was by praying and fasting.
“Honestly, you could never be prepared for what you could see," he said. “Day to day, it was always something different.”
Baker said he worked 14 hour days serving food and water at a shelter housing 700 people, getting people away from active fires and even going with first responders to neighborhoods that turned to ash. The Palisades and Eaton wildfires ended up burning more than 37,000 acres.
“There were no neighborhoods," he said.
But he said most of the relief came from being an open ear.
“Everybody [has] different faith, so spiritually, it’s more like a brotherly love that I carry there with me," he said. "In a conversation, sometimes I do all the talking. A lot of times I do all the listening.”
He said one conversation that stands out to him the most was with a woman who inherited her now burned down home. Baker said it had been bought decades before at a much lower cost than it would be today, and that she didn't know if she’d ever fully recover.
Still, he was moved by the people’s strength.
“They had such a resilience, you know, they were just getting back up and ready to rebuild," he said. “People can live 30 days without food. Three days without water. But not three seconds without hope.”
Baker is now home and looking for a bigger space to expand his church, but hopes to visit the Palisades again in the future.
