Storms!

Storms often scare. A child looking at a thunderstorm is unsettled and looks for its parent. Many nations on the earth have faced massive storms in the past couple years. Storms like Katrina have wrecked havoc on countless 1000's of lives.

How many other individuals have been battling personal storms? High velocity winds gusting through their lives blowing apart all that was once held dear? Torrential rains drowning out everything that was built up as a facade to the world around them? Perhaps heavy snows fell on their lives, cold and wet suffocating the life and vitality of their meager existence on earth.

But let's look at this another way. What if the storms were actually something beautiful? What if when the winds were blowing, the rains were pounding, or the snow was flying, that in reality the unnecessary parts of our life were being eradicated? How many times is it said of people that had near death experiences that afterwards they were going to live their lives differently? Now they would pay less attention to the mundane and trivial and more attention to the smell of the roses and the taste of the air standing beside the sea.

Rachel and I are seeing our fair share of storms. Right now, my beautiful bride is in Alaska helping a family member with 3 disabled children. One is in ICU with pneumonia and Rachel is at home caring for the other two. This is only the latest of a series of storms. None have been life threatening, but all have been god attempts at knocking the Good Ship Pleasants off course.

But then there is that familiar refrain in our heads and hearts. PRAISE GOD! Our ship might be thrown around on the seas of life and change, but we know God is up to something good. We see relationships blooming. We see battles being undertaken in our friends personal lives. We see a lot of people praying. Seriously praying. Praying like their life depends on it. It does.

The cliche', "When the going gets tough, the tough get going" comes to mind. When the storms and the attacks come, it is more than a signal to pray. It is a signal of the good to come afterwards. God does not let us go through struggles without a reason. He does so to get our attention and to call us into the next phase of our life. This is why when we look at the horizon and we see the ominous clouds approaching in our lives, we should not tremble out of fear, but of anticipation, trusting in God for what is going to come after the rains.

I encourage both of you readers to take this to heart. Pray about it. Ask God to help the attitudes of your heart to be trusting in Him and to quiet the fear. If the worse thing that happens is we pass away on this journey, we still win in the end. And if you read this and you don't believe that, read the Bible and pray!