Rhonda Quaney: When We Need To Reach For Higher-Ground

Hints of the coming season change, seem to arrive before the official date on the calendar.

Trees splash saffron color, mums tune up their deep autumn hues and the winds of transition usher in with increasing urgency.

Cooler water laps gentle against the shoreline, as silvery white balls, ride on swells of lake water. If you look closely, you can see that the orbs are birds. Perched on their watery nest, the winged scavengers of the sea, roll and bob with the perpetual sway and ripple motion.

And I wonder who taught them to ride the curl of a wave as if it were nothing? Watching them makes me marvel at God's creation.

Just last week, locals would walk, run and ride their bicycles over the bridge that spans tranquil fingers of sparkling water. And while they went about the day, as if it were any other day, waters roared down the mountains west of here, ripping away in it's path, lives, homes and everything familiar.

The sirens wail and warnings rang out as the water cascaded down, in the aftermath of that destruction. Now it is making its way though one thousand veins of water to this place where I live and on downstream.

The skies were still clear while predictions dominated the news, that waters would rise in epic proportion.

Too well I know, that it doesn't take much to change a meandering stream into a turbulent maelstrom of swirling darkness.

Flood waters and change touch deep places in my veins.

Indeed, I've walked the shores of my devastation.

Its hard to erase the furrows that cut soul and sinew when waters of heartache rise and chew away life.

Time only dims the memory of the day, when I rocked two babies like my life depended on it, while waiting for emergency responders to arrive and untangle what was lost.

And I've stood with my back against the ICU waiting room wall, listening to code red sirens wail, knowing that breath was already gone and efforts to revive the woman who gave me life would soon end.

Yes. Another season of rising waters was ushered in.

You've been there too haven't you?

That diagnoses. That child who you love. That job that was your whole life. That husband who walked out?

So what do we do when the waters threaten to overtake us?
When deep water alters the course of your life forever.
When trauma and trouble threatened to devour you and all you hold dear.
When hope seems to fail and your joy begins to sink.

We have to reach out for Higher-Ground!

It's not mother nature, but the nature of our Father.

He's not flinging catastrophes at us, but He will allow them.

And like a Parent sometime He takes things from the hand of His children. Things that we hold too tight.

Oh, a book could be written, of where I've misplaced my heart friends. Of the places I've looked for my identity, in what I found my value in.

They span ten-thousand empty things, from the places I've lived, the work I do, how beautiful my children are, what size of jeans I wore.

Yes. There are more.

The flood waters, they worked to stripped these things away. They washed over me and threatened to destroy me. But the storms that were intended to destroy me have served to set me free!

I think right here, it is appropriate to say...
Alleluia and Amen!

In this world no matter how gifted, persistent, or dedicated we are, there will come a day when all our efforts cannot change the reality of pain and trouble. There will come a day, if we admit it, that we are helpless to change the circumstances in our lives and we need the Father to reach down and lift us up.

The world tells us to pull ourselves up by the boot straps or blame someone else for the troubles.

May we live like the birds I watch on the lake. Resting as they riding every wave and swell.

May these things bring us closer to the Father who designed us to be vessels of His glory.

This time it was a gracious thing, that for days the warnings rang out, as we could prepare and waited for the churning brown water to arrive.

The people upstream were not all so fortunate.
They are living the reality that death is as much a part of life as the living.

So how do we truly live while we are alive?

What are you holding too tightly in hand today friend?