#1 – Letters to my children series
Photo by Frank Cone: https://www.pexels.com/photo/lightning-2373897/
Dear Sons and Daughters:
I don’t recall who told me this story, but I believe it was your Nana. What I do remember was seeing the two-foot-wide black burn marks wrapped around the rooms halfway up the wall of your great grandmothers Pine Lake home in Alberta. The place I spent all my summer vacations as a child.
It was a hot summer day at the lake. Black clouds rolled in. Your great grandparents smelt the ozone, that scent like fresh laundry just taken down off the clothesline. They heard the thunder rumble; a sound associated with the wide-open spaces of the prairies. We used to count the seconds between this sound and the lightning too see how many miles away the lightning was.
On this occasion there was no time. No time at all, for the lightning zipped through the grass and hit the bottom of lightning rod. This time the lightning rod failed as it ushered the electric current up through the window, into the bedroom, around the bedroom walls into the living room, and out the front door.
The sound was so loud the guest sitting in the living room lost their hearing for three days afterwards. Ginger, the dog, was the one who suffered most. She was terrified of lightning storms ever after, always ran and hide – poor thing.
What happened? A freak of nature your Nana said. Lightning was drawn in by the lightning rod and along the copper house wiring. In it’s wake it melted the wire window screen, ate the copper within the electrical wires, and left a two-foot-wide black burn mark halfway up the walls. It looked like someone had taken a roller and painted that black line. The bonus, the television exploded. This was the days of black and white tube TVs.
It was unexpected, abrupt, a thief in the night. Although unprepared, they were lucky. Only a new television and repairs to the walls were required, and thankfully the guest’s deafness was temporary.
This true story from the Allen family’s history made me think of the freak storms of life. They strike abruptly turning us upside down. My analytical mind began to ask, am I ready if lightning strikes? Does my copper wiring draw lightning through the door of my heart to leave burn marks on my soul?
Life’s freak storms have no warning, but God always has a plan. The house was only scorched not burnt down. The repairs were made and the house stood stronger for it.
What experiences in life have scorched you? These are the experiences which usually result in your most valued life lessons.
Are you the person who became deaf but regained their hearing later? Perhaps you’re the dog who was scarred for life and runs from storms. Or the listener who hears this story and prepares.
Prepared? Know that “life’s struggles are not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Matthew 25:12). Is your head covered with the helmet of salvation; your feet shod with the gospel of peace? Is the breastplate of righteousness in place? Do you cinch up the belt of truth to guard against the lies? Is your shield of faith up, and your sword of the spirit (which is the word of God) at the ready? Finally, is your lamp filled with the oil of the Holy Spirit so as to see the Master when he comes.
Be sure to put on your armor and have a full lamp, for the time is always now. Life is a freak storm.
Sources: Allen Family oral stories, Ephesians 6:10-18, Matthew 25: 1-13
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