In the south, we know how to prepare for ice and snow, but when it comes to hurricanes, well, that’s a different story entirely. We’ve owned a home on the coast so we’ve done due diligence. We’ve installed storm shutters and breakaway lower walls. We’ve dealt with evacuation and flooding, eroding dunes, tainted water, and loss of electricity. It’s an expected part of coastal living, but when you live in the foothills of the western Carolina mountains, hurricane damage isn’t usually on your radar. We were definitely not prepared for Friday’s weather when we found ourselves in the path of Hurricane Helene.
Forecasters painted a conservative picture of five to seven inches of rain early in the week and then downplayed it dramatically by Wednesday to two or three inches. We opened the spillway drains on the lake behind our home two days ahead in preparation. Rain was heavier near our children’s homes but it came down nonstop for thirty-six straight hours in our area. The lake rose steadily and the drainage system was gradually overwhelmed.
Friday morning, the rain stopped but it was the calm before the storm. My husband left for work around 6:30 and the gas stations near us were opened for business, but by the time I awoke around 8:15, high winds had uprooted a huge hardwood in the lower corner of our neighbors’ yard, uprooting 5 sections of our fence before crushing their boathouse. As I focused my phone’s camera on the damage to send a photo to my husband, another tree toppled across the neighbors’ yard with a sickening crack. The saturated ground was outmatched in a tug of war with the wind.
At this point my husband called to say he was safe but stranded. He hadn’t made it to work. Having tried three separate routes, each one detoured by felled trees, he was now stuck between fallen trees where one had come down after he’d passed. He had pulled up next to an abandoned building to wait out the wind that gusted from around seven to ten on Friday morning. I took pictures of the damage surrounding our home, grateful for God’s evident hand of protection, but by the time my husband was able to return home several hours later, more trees had fallen at the end of our street. Our next door neighbor was hit hardest. So much devastation in just a few hours.
In five days, we’ve seen lines for gasoline several hours long at the few stations with power and stores that have opened with no power limiting customers and recording cash only purchases with pen and paper. I did not leave my neighborhood until today, when my girls and I took their children to visit my parents to do a couple loads of laundry. They live an hour north and their power returned within a few days. They supplied us with gas for our generator and groceries for our babies, not because they’d stockpiled necessities, but because their stores were already opened.
This storm took us all by surprise, and as a result, shelves of generators, gas cans, and chainsaws were emptied and it’s impossible to find a case of bottled water. Watching as events unfold, even though they are isolated on a worldwide scale, has caused me to think about what I could have done to be more prepared for a crisis moving forward. What should I keep on hand, not be caught without, or replenish regularly? Which items do I own that seemed like necessities have I been able to live without? How might I reprioritize moving forward so that I’m prepared for whatever life brings? Reacting rarely produces the kind of result we desire. Much better to be pre-prayer-ed.
“Listen, those of you who are boasting, “Today or tomorrow we’ll go to another city and spend some time and go into business and make heaps of profit!”
But you don’t have a clue what tomorrow may bring. For your fleeting life is but a warm breath of air that is visible in the cold only for a moment and then vanishes!
Instead you should say, “Our tomorrows are in the Lord’s hands and if he is willing we will live life to its fullest and do this or that.”
But here you are, boasting in your ignorance, for to be presumptuous about what you’ll do tomorrow is evil!
So if you know of an opportunity to do the right thing today, yet you refrain from doing it, you’re guilty of sin.”
James 4:13-17 TPT
https://bible.com/bible/1849/jas.4.13-17.TPT
“Speaking to the people, Jesus continued, “Be alert and guard your heart from greed and from always wishing for what you don’t have.
For your life can never be measured by the amount of things you possess.”
Jesus then gave them this illustration: “A wealthy land owner had a farm that produced bumper crops.
Every year the harvest was so great it filled his barns to overflowing!
He thought, ‘What should I do now that every barn is full and I have nowhere else to store more?
I know what I’ll do! I’ll tear down the barns and build one massive barn to hold all my grain and goods.
Then I can just sit back, surrounded with comfort and ease. I’ll enjoy life with no worries at all.’
God said to him, ‘What a fool you are to trust in your riches and not in me!
This very night the messengers of death will demand to take your life.
Then who will get all the wealth you have stored up for yourself?’
The same thing will happen to all those who fill up their lives with everything but God.””
Luke 12:15-21 TPT
https://bible.com/bible/1849/luk.12.15-21.TPT
“Enjoy prosperity while you can, but when hard times strike, realize that both come from God.
Remember that nothing is certain in this life.”
Ecclesiastes 7:14 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/ecc.7.14.NLT
Our younger son and his wife plan to build a home on land we own. We’ve been talking about which piece of land to clear for over a year. Higher ground for sure, but there were so many sprawling oaks and towering hardwoods that it was difficult to consider removing any of them. God authorized Helene to take many of them out of the equation in just a few hours time. Though Job’s loss far exceeds our own, his reply is especially apt.
“Job stood up and tore his robe in grief. Then he shaved his head and fell to the ground to worship.
He said, “I came naked from my mother’s womb, and I will be naked when I leave.
The Lord gave me what I had, and the Lord has taken it away.
Praise the name of the Lord!”
In all of this, Job did not sin by blaming God.”
Job 1:20-22 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/job.1.21.NLT
When I arrived home this evening, my husband greeted me by opening my van door for me. He pointed across the lake to the row of house lights reflected in the water that hadn’t been there the previous evening. “It looks as if power is being restored nearby. Let me show you how to switch off the generator if I’m not here when our power comes back on.” Hope is like that- it brings out the best in us. Prayer is key. God doesn’t need me to tell Him to know what I’m thinking. I need to tell Him so that He can correct wrong thinking and replace it with His higher ways. Sometimes it takes a storm to remind me. How about you?
“Where once there were thorns, cypress trees will grow.
Where nettles grew, myrtles will sprout up.
These events will bring great honor to the Lord’s name; they will be an everlasting sign of his power and love.””
Isaiah 55:13 NLT
A Fitting Reply 