Oh, a quick note from Waco before I begin. The Spain mission team made it home safely. Wish the same could be said for their luggage. About half of it is somewhere between London and Houston. Or maybe between Valencia and London …
We woke up yesterday to a really nice morning. Sun was shining (or it got to shining as soon as it woke up). Temperature was manageable - around 80 or so. But out in the Gulf …
Now-Tropical Storm Beryl was busy strengthening and making her way on a line toward Matagorda Bay, just south of us, placing us on the “dirty side” of the storm. Weather radar showed the initial outer bands of rain and wind ever-so slowly making their way toward us, inching ever closer in the future-track interactive screens. Ain’t technology grand?
Back in my youth we lobbied our parents to stay in town so we could go stand on the seawall and watch the angry waves. On the times when that failed, the family just retreated to Spring to a relative’s house and waited.
Then as I grew older with kids of my own, we deliberately sat through a few storms - just so they could experience the fun of it. Well, that and Chris had to work.
Then Mom came to live with us, and she got a little too nervous to stay, so we evacuated early and had hurricane parties at Josh’s house. From there, all we could do was watch TV for The Weather Channel’s Jim Cantore to show up and tell us which parts of the coast were being totally destroyed. Also, we insisted that Josh get cable for our trip so we could get local updates. Now? I guess we’re reverting back to the sit through it phase.
Our initial task for the morning was to get to Sam’s house. She had a few things in her garage that needed to be moved upstairs. We also brought her car back to our house so it would be parked on a little bit higher ground.
Well, we did make a stop before coming home. No. Not Walmart. We joined the other 22 brave souls at church. The staff put together a somewhat abbreviated version of the worship service for us. Then afterward Kel offered out himself and his hearty children to help anyone who needed help getting their homes ready for the impending weather. We headed on home to do the same.
The rest of the afternoon we spent watching TV and keeping one eye on the storm. We started getting the outer bands in earnest around 3 p.m. That’s always an eerie time. One minute the sun is shining and wind is calm and nice. The next, the skies are dark and angry. Thunder rolls. Rain falls, often sideways. And the wind whips through the trees, causing them to dip perilously, then sway back and forth. It’s a beautiful, scary mishmash demonstration of God’s awesome power.
Of course it got worse. We got up around 3 a.m. I just wanted to look at the sycamore trees in the front yard. They are much taller than the house, and they have a tendency toward that sway and bend to their max. I’ll just say this … they did not disappoint. The winds were sustained around 40 mph here, with gusts up to at least 60. The storm actually came ashore at Matagorda, as expected, around 3:30 as a category one hurricane. All the hurricane and tornado and storm surge and flood warnings were renewed for our area.
My fire department app was indicating call after call, for power outages, downed trees, transformers on fire, power lines down. Even a stuck elevator. I know our fire fighters will be exhausted when this is all over.
I tried to get back to sleep like Chris did. To no avail. I finally just got up so I could do some praying for my fire fighters and some … experiencing.
1 Thessalonians 4:11 says, to seek to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you
Father, thanks for getting Josh and Caleb and the Columbus Avenue Baptist Church Spain mission team home safely. Please work out the same for the rest of their luggage. And thank you for protecting us through the literal storm last night. Please continue to watch over us as Beryl barrels her way through. Amen.
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