Stormy skies

I was having lunch with a friend today and while we sat, eating our food, I looked out at the skies and saw some really incredible clouds moving overhead. Dark clouds that could mean nothing other than a torrential downpour. I fully expected to hear the klaxon sirens signifying a tornado sighting. A couple of minutes later...it hit. Seriously strong winds whipped the trees back and forth and sent loose debris careening down the parking lot. Then the rain came. Big fat drops of rain that seemed enough to drench you with one drop. All this lasted...one minute. That's it. One minute. Barely enough time to open your umbrella and get from the car to the doorway. I couldn't believe it! I was prepared to sit the afternoon in a restaurant and wait, but the ferocity didn't live up to the foreboding.

It is like that many times in our Christian walk. We see the clouds and the dark skies over our lives. The wind, by itself, seems to be enough to flatten us. We worry and fret and then... nothing much really happens.

Do you see harsh times as inevitable? Consider the widow in I Kings 17. God told Elijah to go to Zarephath to stay at a widow ladies house. When he arrived, he asked for a little water and some bread because he had been travelling and was hungry. The widow replied that she had almost no supplies and that she was going to bake one last loaf of bread for her and her son and that they would die of starvation soon after. There was a drought in the land and food was scarce. Elijah revealed that if she would make a loaf for him and then one for her and her son, that her supplies would not run out until the drought was lifted. How much worry and dread had this woman endured before the arrival of the prophet...and for good reason. All that worry, however, was for nothing because God provided for her through the prophet Elijah.

Don't let the clouds of fear and doubt paralyze you as a Christian. God will allow nothing to keep you from your service if you will do what He tells you to do. Worry does us no good and much evil - Matthew 6:31-34. Trust in God to help you look to sunnier skies.