The Storm Ahead

Old Journal Entry:

Right now as I write the tornado sirens are going off, and there is a tornado warning out. My husband says it is nothing to worry about, so here we are just sitting in an RV hoping the Lord keeps us safe in all our stupidity and not listening to warnings. I. AM. NOT. A. FAN. OF. TORNADOS. OR. STORMS.

The next day…

Update, still alive after tornado sirens and storm. Honestly, nothing happened, barely even a sprinkle. It is a good reminder that there are times storms come into our lives that aren’t that “big” or “bad”, but our response makes it a bigger deal than it is. The anxiety or fear of the storm that we allow to come in is bigger than the storm. The stress that we put on ourselves can be bigger than the trial. What becomes the biggest part of our storm can be what we put on ourselves. Learning to trust in Jesus takes that off of us and puts it in His hands. It is then that when you look at a storm on the horizon, and with your expectation of how it is going to be, you think that you cannot face it, you will realize after it passes that it really wasn’t “that big of a deal” in the first place. If you place your trust in Him, you do not have to fret in the storm.

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Have you ever been in a place where you can see problems ahead? These may be problems that are really coming, or maybe they are problems that are something we are “expecting” out of fear of what may happen.

There have been many times in my life that I have allowed fear to grip ahold of me. I have to remind myself that this is not of God, and I have to draw strength and encouragement from spending time with Him and in His Word.

The Google definition of fear is “an unpleasant emotion based on the belief…”

The belief, our belief, where we are putting our trust!

I’m going to use a fun example from our lives…

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Another Old Journal Entry:

While we were in North Carolina we decided we wanted to do something fun. We haven’t been able to do anything “fun” like a zoo, sightseeing, etc since being full time on the road, due to sickness and other circumstances out of our hands. We decided we wanted to go to Mayberry, where Andy Griffith was filmed. We are big fans of Andy Griffith and this seemed like an affordable adventure. WE stopped at a drive thru on the way… our truck wouldn’t move from the drive thru window. Derek put it in park and tried again with no luck. He was finally able to manually put it in first gear and we got out of the drive thru line, with our food, that is the important part. We parked and both busted out laughing. I mean, what else are you supposed to do? Things are just falling apart around us. Yet there is so much peace… You don’t understand what I am saying? You should just get to know the God that I know. He is just like that, the peace in the storm. Fast forward to our trip home… we want to make it home for Christmas, so we tackle trying to take this ticking time bomb of a truck back home for Christmas while pulling our fifth wheel. Let's just say that we were going 10mph up hills on the interstate. We made it safe and sound though! A memory for the books.

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You see, whenever this happened, we saw a trial ahead. We could have reacted in different ways, and we could have had some different expectations. 1. We could have been upset, stressed, and angry. We had the reason to be, right? We were going to have to replace our transmission, which was not cheap. We use our truck to pull our home, so if we aren’t able to do that then we are stuck wherever we are. We wanted to be home for Christmas! 2. We could laugh about the situation, rejoice in the fact that we had our food from the drive-thru, and we were about to go out on an adventure of driving a truck eight hours in the mountains with a failing transmission. This may seem like a silly example, but how many times before have I let situations out of my control turn into bigger stressors and trials than they ever needed to be.

We made it home, have a great story to tell, and the best part of all is… God took care of it. We didn’t end up having to pay a penny for our transmission. We had a third party warranty that the mechanic warned us normally will not cover it, covered it all except $250. We then had someone give us the $250 to cover it. Were there times along the process that we began to worry? Yes, but we sought the Lord. He then took care of it, even greater than we expected!

I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. Psalm 34:4

Just like God did for David, He will do for you. Seek Him, and he will deliver you from all of your fears. Don’t let your expectation or fear be greater than the storm itself. I have learned that God will usually reveal something beautiful after the storm has passed.