Disclaimer: Any and all of the following comments may have been written under the influence of too little sleep and too much caffeine. The author apologizes to whoever is kind enough to actually continue reading.
Usually nothing short of the apocalypse or Becca sleep-talking will wake me in the middle of the night, but after being away from NC for the past two springs I guess the approaching storm was strange enough to shake off my dreams. Warm, humid stillness thick with the scent of rain. The approach of far-off thunder, muffled drumbeats beneath the taut skin of cotton field and woodland. The cool, pine-spiced wind, rushing and hissing like waves on the sand. Pale, cold brightness lingering unnaturally long, the crack of brittle sky. Wind, rain, and thunder roll through the whipping pines – the gut-shaking thud of a thousand fireworks, the cracking report of artillery, the rumble of a waking dragon rising from the earth. His roar rattles the windows and creeps beneath my skin. Love wrestles fear. The thrill of excitement is also a shiver of terror in the irrational realm of night.
“Then the earth shook and trembled; the foundations of the hills also quaked and were shaken, because He was angry. He bowed the heavens also, and came down with darkness under His feet. And He rode upon a cherub, and flew; He flew upon the wings of the wind. He made the darkness His secret place; His canopy around Him was dark waters and thick clouds of the skies. The LORD thundered from heaven, and the Most High uttered His voice, hailstones and coals of fire. He sent out His arrows and scattered the foe, lightnings in abundance, and He vanquished them.” – Psalm 18:7, 9-11, 13-14
The words of Psalm 18 are coming true. God walks the dark skies tonight. Each bolt is from His quiver, and it strikes wherever He wills. I weave a lifeline of the whispered words and cling to it. If this is the power of God’s handiwork alone, who can stand before Him? Could I bear to hear that holy voice above the thunder, could my frame hold such fear, such love? As the sky tears and the earth shakes, I can understand why Israel trembled before Mt. Sinai and begged “Now therefore, why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the LORD our God anymore, than we shall die.” I know why the disciples cried out in terror when the storm overtook their small fishing boat and the darkness shrouded them in roaring wind and lashing rain on towering seas, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!”
“Those who go down to the sea in ships, who do business on great waters, they see the works of the LORD, and His wonders in the deep. For He commands and raises the stormy wind, which lifts up the waves of the sea. They go down again to the depths; their soul melts because of trouble. They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end. Then they cry out to the LORD in their trouble, and He brings them out of their distresses. He calms the storm, so that its waves are still. Then they are glad because they are quiet; so He guides them to their desired haven. Oh, that men would give thanks to the LORD for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men!” – Psalm 107:23-31
Did the disciples remember these words when they asked, “Who can this be, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?”
Man proclaims that God is dead. He was only a dream of our ignorant ancestors, happily buried in past dark ages as we stepped into the glorious light of our own making. Science is lord. Reason is lord. Man is lord. We are so saturated with a science that sees the world as a well-tuned but impersonal machine that it’s easy to go about life blind to the hand of God in every detail around us. It’s easy to forget God is omnipresent and omnipotent in the humdrum moments of life, easy to switch to autopilot (just read the Old Testament… we seem to be creatures of singular ability in this area). And I am certainly the chief of sinners. But tonight I can not forget.
“The LORD lives! Blessed be my Rock! Let the God of my salvation be exalted.” – Psalm 18:46
There is something about thunderstorms that is otherworldly. There must be a reason the Olympians’ chief god was Zeus, why the Germanic tribes gave Thor his thunderbolt, why Luther tried to bargain with God not to strike him down with lightning on the road. “The LORD lives!” The words are written in fire on my tongue with every flash of lightning. Who can doubt that He lives and reigns in heaven and on earth?
“Who has divided a channel for the overflowing water, or a path for the thunderbolt?” – Job 38:25
“Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, that an abundance of water may cover you? Can you send out lightnings, that they may go, and say to you, ‘Here we are!’?” – Job 38:34-35
In the night, I see the crackling lightning shafts assemble before His throne, shoulder to shoulder with the high-spirited winds and grim-faced stormclouds. The bright throng lining the halls of heaven watch breathlessly in awe and delight at their LORD’s great play, His magnum opus, scene 834,793,249. Or perhaps they have lost count. There’s no time to look at the program, to tear their eyes away.
Nature is not a machine – cold, clockwork, automatic. It is consistent, thanks be to God, but never out of necessity. Chesterton writes that “Nature is a sister, and even a younger sister: a little dancing sister, to be laughed at as well as loved.” Sometimes we spend so long looking down at roots and beginnings like Gollum, searching for secrets, laws of nature, that we forget to look up and see the laughing light of miracles as well. Waking up and eating breakfast and pulling weeds on a sunny day isn’t run-of-the mill at all. Each night my body plays death in sleep only to come back to life each morning… I open my eyes and see light soaking through the curtains. I eat, and bread and butter became skin stretched over flesh and blood and bones. Each day a million skin cells fall from my body and return to the dust we brush from baseboards. A lanky, golden-maned weed erupts from a tiny down parachute that fell in the garden. God’s handiwork is real and strange and breathtaking.
“It is possible that God says every morning, ‘Do it again’ to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition of Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore.” – G.K. Chesterton
Sometimes, after weeks of not noticing it hits me over the head – I could fly into a thousand fragments of nothing if God wasn’t continually speaking me into existence. And He did it again today! God is so generous with His mercies that I forget how astounding they are. A morning erupts into surprise and joy and thankfulness for God’s incredible grace and love towards us. He is in the quiet sunny morning as well as the thundering storms of night.
“Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”
“I’m longing to see him,” said Peter, “even if I do feel frightened when it comes to the point.” – C.S. Lewis
Thunderstorms are things of power, and I love their great beauty and strength, yet they can inspire fear for the same reasons. I fear God and His great power and might and glory – it is too great for me. Yet I love Him for the same reasons. I hunger to approach that beauty and awesome power though I tremble that my frailness will crumble in His hand. Yet so often the power and destruction a thunderstorm threatens, though it may strike and blacken the tallest tree, brings only rain to feed the thirsty earth. And even so God in His endless mercy does not strike us as we deserve, but One who was mightier and stronger was stricken that we, the dust of the earth, might drink freely and live. To us, His hand is raised in love.
“You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.” – Psalm 145:16
What wondrous love is this? This might and power, our shield and fortress. This riot and dance of creation, a masterpiece through which we walk and taste His goodness, and see Him in a mirror dimly. This God, alive! And full of blessings. Hallelujah.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy and will break
In blessings on your head.
Soli Deo Gloria 