HC student in Washington describes response to attacks

Huntington, Ind. "For one Huntington College student, avoiding the terrorist attacks on Washington and New York became a matter of "divine providence."

HC senior Jeff Keiser, an Educational Ministries major from Knox, Ind., is completing a seven-month internship in youth ministry at Camp Sonshine, a Christian camp in Silver Spring, Md., twenty minutes outside Washington D.C.

Keiser, who also works afternoons at Washington Christian Academy with an after-school program, said that the devastation has been tragic. In the wake of the tragedy, though, unity is being felt around the city. "Just about every church in the area was open for prayer Tuesday night and different denominations are uniting together to bring their requests before God," said Keiser, adding that a co-worker said to him, God is waking up a sleeping church.

Like the rest of the nation, many people in D.C. are waiting in long lines to give blood. Keiser said many roads are closed, and the D.C. public is told that the best way for them to help is to donate blood and contribute financially to relief efforts.

Keiser visited the Pentagon for the first time on Sunday, just two days before a hijacked airliner smashed into the famous five-sided building. And on Tuesday, the day of the attack, Keiser was scheduled to take a co-worker to the airport in New York. At the last minute, that co-worker changed her plans, and decided to travel by bus instead. Keiser says he is grateful that "God kept me from being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"As a college, we give sincere thanks to God for his protection over Jeff and we join in earnest prayers for all those affected by this tragedy," said HC spokesperson Bethany Manter.