‘It will still be our home': Los Angeles Latter-day Saints find hope following recent wildfire horrors
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — On Jan. 7, Utah native resident Wendy Garff was on the job as an educator at the Pacific Palisades' Calvary Christian School when she smelled smoke.
The kids in her classroom were enjoying a party, so she slipped away to the school office to see if others were aware.
Garff learned that news of a nearby, growing wildfire was already spreading and everyone was being told to stay in their classrooms. Ten minutes later, orders came to evacuate the children and hustle to the beach on foot to connect with waiting parents.
'We got all the kids in their backpacks and started evacuating,' Garff told the Deseret News. 'There were cars everywhere and you could see flames coming down the mountain. The kids started crying.'
After reaching the beach and ensuring the children were safe and accounted for, Garff made the long walk to her home in the Palisades flatlands. Soon she and the family labradoodle, George, were in their vehicle and heading to a hotel for the night.
Initially, Garff was not overly concerned about the fate of the two-level house where she and her husband, fellow Utahn Matthew Garff, had raised their three children and built their lives.
Their home, after all, was miles from the hills where local wildfires typically ignite and are contained.
Matthew Garff, meanwhile, was on a business trip in Minnesota when his phone started dinging with news of a wildfire in the Palisades area.
'Then Wendy called and said it seemed serious,' he recalled. 'I thought, 'Well, maybe for some people — but not for us'.'
A day later, the Garff family home was little more than a smoking lot of rubble, ash, blackened appliances and broken brick.
The Garffs' wildfire story of uncertainty and loss is one that could be told by legions of their neighbors across Los Angeles County.
More than 11,000 homes were destroyed in last month's wildfires. Thousands more local residents were displaced, leaving entire communities in limbo.
The emotional and financial tolls being exacted by one of the nation's costliest disasters in history may never be fully realized.
Counted among the many being affected by the Los Angeles County wildfires are many Latter-day Saint families — including the Garffs.
Scores of members of the Church of Jesus Christ living in the Pacific Palisades and the Altadena communities lost their homes. And like their neighbors and friends, they are saddened, disoriented and overwhelmed by the myriad ways their lives have been upheaved.
But even while eyeing the difficult months and years ahead — many wildfire victims add they are hopeful and at peace.
They know others are looking out for them. They are looking out for others.
Mike and Susan Christensen live in the Altadena community, some 40 miles away from the Garffs.
On the same day that Wendy Garff watched wildfire slicing across her Pacific Palisades neighborhood, the Christensens witnessed an eerily similar scene.
The couple was sitting in their dining room when they spotted an orange glow rising from Eaton Canyon to the east. The canyon is relatively far from their Altadena home — and the possibility of wildfire reaching their placid, tree-lined streets seemed unlikely.
But the growing flames from distant Eaton Canyon still unnerved Mike Christensen a bit.
'The wind was intense — and it was going right across these properties to the ocean to the southwest of us,' he said. 'So we went out and watched the fire for the next hour-and-a-half as it raced around the mountain.'
Calls to evacuate soon followed. But like the Garffs, the Christensens were not initially worried.
'We got a couple things out of the house and figured we were going to be back in our house the next day — which was a huge, wrong assumption,' said Mike Christensen.
Finding refuge in a parking lot near the Rose Bowl, the Christensens spent a fitful night sleeping in their car.
'When we woke up, Susan immediately got online and started looking for reports. … You could see property markers in red showing all the houses that had burned.'
Initially, the Christensen home appeared to have survived the fiery night.
'And then, 10 or 15 minutes later, Susan looked again and said, 'Our whole street's red.''
Amid the chaos, the couple made their way back to their neighborhood to confirm that their home was indeed lost.
'When we got here, it was like standing over a grave — everything was already gone,' said Susan Christensen.
Weeks later, the couple say they are still sometimes visited by sadness or sentimentality.
'But mostly, we've just asked: 'What can we do — and how can we help other people?'' said Susan Christensen.
Their questions were immediately answered by allowing firefighters to draw water from their swimming pool to try and douse nearby flames.
'We're happy that somebody else's house was safe because of our pool.'
Flames claimed the American flag that had waved on a pole in Christensen's front yard. So Susan immediately ordered a new flag, raising it above the ash and blackened remnants of her home.
'Our neighbors have said it's great to have that American flag back,' she said. 'It's a symbol of fortitude and (a signal) that we're all coming back.
When Latter-day Saint families such as the Garffs and Christensens are asked about what they lost in the fire, they fight emotion remembering items that can't be replaced.
Matthew Garff, for one, had a box filled with dozens of handwritten letters that his late father, Peter Garff, had written to him while he was serving a mission.
Each of those letters were filled with life's lessons from a loving father to his son.
Similarly, Mike Christensen remembers picking through the rubble piles that were once his home in hopes of finding a page or two from his own missionary journals.
He was unsuccessful.
But even while dealing, day-to-day, with the realities of the recent disaster, many are discovering strength in their faith and the kindness of others — including friends, fellow congregants and strangers.
'Our house perished — but we didn't perish with it,' said Mike Christensen, adding that he chooses each day to avoid focusing on what's been lost.
'I feel I'm so blessed and so fortunate for the community and for the country that I live in — and that people immediately rallied around us and had the resources to do it,' he added. 'These things happen all over the world all the time… and many people don't have a way back out of it.'
Bishop Darren Baker grew up in Utah — delivering the afternoon Deseret News as a boy and, later, attending Jordan High School.
For the past three years, Baker has served as the bishop of the Pasadena Ward, Pasadena California Stake — a congregation severely impacted by the recent wildfires.
Surviving the wildfire experience — according to Bishop Baker and his wife, Amanda Baker — stands as a potent reminder of the power of faith and looking out for the family to your left and the family to your right.
'It has been really amazing and uplifting to see how people have just sort of stepped up and worked to help each other. And that hasn't always been an easy thing,' said Baker.
From the wildfires' first moments, folks began following an impulse to serve that stretches beyond any temporary church calling or assignment, he added.
Instead, said Baker, people across congregations are simply saying: 'These are people I care about. They're part of my community. We have love for each other. This is our opportunity and our obligation to try to help them out when they're in a difficult situation.'
The Bakers and their children recently returned to their family home. But the healing relief of being back within the walls of their temporal shelter can't match the spiritual security they feel gathering with fellow Latter-day Saints and friends.
'Just to be with people, and to be able to hug them and just know that we're going to get through this together — and we're going to be stronger because of it,' said Amanda Baker.
'It's just really beautiful — and I've seen those moments happen over and over again. We are here for each other.'
The Garffs estimate almost three dozen homes in their ward were destroyed by wildfire. In the immediate aftermath, there were few opportunities to worship together. That's been one of the hardest disruptions to manage.
Wendy Garff said her spirit now soars whenever she's with fellow members of her Pacific Palisades Ward.
Local church leaders, she added, 'want us to stay together and at least meet twice a month on Sundays, even though it's in a different building.'
Latter-day Saints and many of their neighbors have also been uplifted by visiting Latter-day Saint leaders.
On Saturday, President Jeffrey R. Holland spoke to a standing-room only congregation in the Van Nuys community — assuring folks impacted by the wildfires that they were not isolated or forgotten.
Bishop Baker believes that President Holland and other church leaders are performing divinely appointed work.
'(President Holland's) work is to minister and to invite people to come to (Christ). It's to provide comfort when we need it — and it's to marshal those temporal resources that are also very important.'
The coming months and years remain uncertain for those who lost their homes to the Los Angeles wildfires of 2025. Some will rebuild. Others will not.
Both the Christiansens and the Garffs plan to return to the neighborhoods they love — and then begin again.
While recently standing a few feet away from a lot of destruction and rubble where a beautiful house once stood, Wendy Garff could still feel the warmth of being, well, back home.
'It feels good to be here,' she said. 'I feel the fresh air. I see the blue skies. And I feel like this is still going to be our home.
'It will be different — but we still feel hopeful. It will never be the same. We won't have everything back. But it will still be our home.'
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