Clouds

The storm clouds were clearly visible.  Even though they were just coming in from the west, it was clear we were going to be hit and hit hard!  The telltales were everywhere.  It was hot, sunny, and humid in and around the building.  The oppressive summer humidity was haunting everyone daring to venture into its grip.  Peaking through the building were dark clouds on the horizon.  They had a deep flat bottom with dark fingers reaching up into an unending fading gray mass.  As they grow closer the swirling wind began to toss loose papers and trash into the air, making things dance on the rising currents between the tall buildings in midtown Manhattan.
 
After a while even the unknowing knew something was going to happen.  The crack of thunder resonated through the building just as the lightening strike pushed down through the break in the buildings immediately south of my vantage point.  A short pause and everything broke loose; wind, rain, and more morphing into a soup pouring, swirling, and coating everything caught in its grasp.
 
I couldn’t help but imagine how the scene before me could play out as a living metaphor.  I know “at that time God will unsheathe his sword, his merciless, massive, mighty sword.  He'll punish the serpent Leviathan as it flees, the serpent Leviathan thrashing in flight.  He'll kill that old dragon that lives in the sea.”  (Isaiah 27.1)  Everything will bend, fold, and disappear in God’s path.
 
Yet the metaphor didn’t end there.  I was safe and secure, watching it all.  You and I can always be that way; in God’s arms, within Divinity’s protection and care.  Even as life’s chaos, pain, and destruction consume our lives, we can take shelter with God.  There will be times where we suffer in extreme pain and anguish.  Yet in and through everything, God’s assurance and hope extend into our lives. 
 
In time the clouds past.  I found myself in a land refreshed and full of hope.  This will be your destiny and mine if God’s hope is realized in our lives.