Psalm 20:1
Good News Translation
May the Lord answer
you when you are in trouble!
May the God of Jacob protect you!
This past summer we had an appointment at the Uchee Pines
Lifestyle Center. We spent the week before our appointment visiting relatives
in Florida—something we don’t get to do very often. While in central Florida we
watched the development of Hurricane Elsa in the Atlantic. It moved steadily
west and finally crossed the southern end of Florida. That slowed it down, and
it degenerated into a tropical storm. But once it was over the Caribbean, it
picked up extra energy and then whirled around like a snake and came back at
us, like a vicious adder, to strike the northern part of Florida.
During the actual time it stuck, we had to drive through
that northern part of Florida in order to get to our appointments on time. It
had rained every day while we were in Florida, but that was simply kids’ play,
compared to Elsa.
As we headed north that day, we prayed that the Lord would
protect us in the storm. The wind was fierce and buffeted us relentlessly for
four hours. It rained and poured as we groped our way north across the heart of
the storm.
We have a cap on the back of our Ford pickup where we had a
bed ready made for us to simply climb in and go to sleep. Driven by the wind,
the rain came in around the edges of the cap and soaked the edges of our
mattress and sleeping bags.
But the God of Jacob indeed protected us. Nothing we had was
really damaged. We experienced no accident while driving up the freeway with
its hurrying cars and trucks, some passing us or we passing them.
Finally, well into Georgia we stopped at a restaurant for
some dinner. It was still pouring down rain. They were out of most of the items
on their menu. We were served something and started to eat. Sylvia noticed
water pouring down an inside wall of the restaurant. I said, “Don’t tell them,
or they’ll drive us out!” Then the electricity went out. Probably the rain had
short circuited the electricity. We finished the first part of our order. They
couldn’t finish the other part because of the power outage.
The manager suddenly panicked at the developments. She
phoned the owner who demanded that we evacuate the restaurant in case the flat
roof caved in. She told us to leave. When I offered to pay her, she calmed down
and told us they couldn’t charge us for all this. We left in haste, thanking
the God of Jacob for His intervention.
We found a cozy motel in Cordele, Georgia, and spent a dry
night with thanksgiving. Although Elsa had wet our bed in the back of the
pickup, it dried out reasonably quickly within the next few days.
Thank You, God of Jacob, for protecting us from the storm
and the hazards of freeway driving in it.
[1]
https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/news/2021/07/05/tropical-storm-watches-extended-from-bay-area-northward You can see the outline of Florida in white
across the $1.2 billion damage hurricane Elsa. We drove across the main
diameter of the storm in a northwesterly direction, from central Florida into
Georgia.
