Encouragement for Wind, Wave, and Hurricanes

We sang In Christ Alone at Church on Sunday. Can I just tell you that “all other ground is sinking sand” hit differently as I thought about our friends and family in Tennessee and the Carolinas? To what do we cling when the very earth melts under your feet and is washed away carrying your belongings and everything you belonged to with it? Certainly Christ alone.

I’ve been hearing from friends, family, and readers sharing about the horrors they are experiencing and the hope they are finding in the kindness of neighbors and strangers. Here are some of their requests:

  • Dealing with the realities of death–recovery, trying to preserve dignity in places without power until there has been enough clean-up done to bury the dead, notifying family that has been misplaced.
  • The many linemen there working–they are doing hard work in dangerous and unstable places, sleeping in parking lots, very long hours.
  • Instability for kids and families–no routines, no school, feeling like time has stood still for you and is marching on for the rest of the world.
  • The arduous work of clean up.
  • The financial strain of clean up, recovery, and repair on budgets that are already stretched to the max.

Our hearts are with you friends. I looked at the map that showed the now darkened path of Hurricane Helene where the power and lights went out and can’t help but hope in our good God and the people of this area. I pray this dark stretch is the birthplace of a light that can’t be put out in our nation. We have done many mission trips for hurricane and tornado relief, both immediately after a disaster and months to years after. The storms absolutely leave their mark, both on the land and the people. I can think of no better place for revival to begin than among already faithful people who have been stripped of every convenience, comfort, and crutch and found entirely dependent on the Lord. What they are seeing even now is that He IS Provider, He IS near and able. The storms we have endured have been very clarifying, very quickly. Of all that was lost, HE REMAINED and does still.

Praying His mercies over you.

 

—On Wind and Wave

As long as you are self-sufficient, you need not ask God for anything.

We are bowed low now, Lord.

 

In deep waters, you have our attention.

 

With needs so great, one request answered would hardly suffice. Needs that can’t be numbered, wounds so deep they can’t be seen enough to treat.

We certainly realize our dependent State.

 

What then should we ask?

 

When storms truly strip us of every branch or crutch we cling to and brokenness reveals our lack, we are well beyond asking for mere comfort or convenience.

And we cry out simply to be saved.

And, we are.

 

We were saved before winds, before waves, and crested streams.

We were saved before overwhelming floods, saved before first drops fell.

We were saved before skies darkened or clouds began to form.

We were saved before the foundation of the world, saved before the Spirit hovered over the face of the deep.

 

What then do we ask, when we have nothing left?

Nothing except the promise—that we have indeed been saved?

We ask nothing.

 

With such riches, what more could we need?

 

We lift weary, empty hands—not to receive, or in the making of demands. We reach them high in sincerest praise.

 

I need not ask Him be merciful, He is.

I need not ask Him be faithful, He is.

I need not ask Him to provide or remain by my side.

Even in devastation and darkness I know He does.

I need not ask was He there, did He see, did He care?

His grace sufficient answers every question my heavy heart would pose.

 

Should He choose to restore, I will praise Him on dry shores for all He’s done and has yet to do.

But, should the storm rage on and the clouds never break, should my eyes close or my head sink, and I surrender unto deep—I pray my last breath will be given in worship justified.

 

I will praise Him all the more.

When I finally see, what I’d only known in hope before.

Friend, He Is! HE IS. He is more.

And I was saved indeed.

 

 

1 Comments

  1. Debbie Russell on August 31, 2023 at 9:23 PM

    Wow, so beautifully written. As I read, I came across this paragraph:

    I need not ask Him be merciful, He is.

    I need not ask Him be faithful, He is.

    I need not ask Him to provide or remain by my side.

    Even in devastation and darkness I know He does.

    I need not ask was He there, did He see, did He care?

    His grace sufficient answers every question my heavy heart would pose.

    My throat got a lump and my eyes swelled up with tears; you see I was not devastated by a “natural disaster”, I have been left to pick up the pieces of the “storm” after the loss of my oldest daughter. THANK YOU for your testament to His faithfulness!

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