READ: Romans 8:35-37
Lightning struck a tree by my neighbor’s barn. We all heard it; it was so loud. During the wind and rain and storm, the lightning hit too close to not have hit a tree. We knew a tree was dead. Morning confirmed it. A fifty-foot high oak tree was struck by lightning, and today it has a gash from one end of the trunk to the other. Near the ground the split in the bark looks as though it exploded inside the tree with wood splintering outward in all directions. Sometimes life crashes around us. In one sudden moment, something happens and everything we know splinters in a thousand directions. It may not be lightning, but it could be a tornado, a car crash, a heart attack, an over dose or the doctor saying, “I’m so sorry, but there was nothing we could do.” Crash and your world changes. What do you do in those moments when everything seems to be falling around you? You can panic, cower in fear, weep and wail, or shake your fist at heaven. Sometimes we do all those things. But the best thing I know to do is to trust the Lord who reminds us that when we stay rooted in Him and in His love, that we are unshakeable and unrootable. I think that was what Paul was trying to say when he said, “We are more than conquerors through Christ who loves us.”
Lightning struck a tree by my neighbor’s barn. We all heard it; it was so loud. During the wind and rain and storm, the lightning hit too close to not have hit a tree. We knew a tree was dead. Morning confirmed it. A fifty-foot high oak tree was struck by lightning, and today it has a gash from one end of the trunk to the other. Near the ground the split in the bark looks as though it exploded inside the tree with wood splintering outward in all directions. Sometimes life crashes around us. In one sudden moment, something happens and everything we know splinters in a thousand directions. It may not be lightning, but it could be a tornado, a car crash, a heart attack, an over dose or the doctor saying, “I’m so sorry, but there was nothing we could do.” Crash and your world changes. What do you do in those moments when everything seems to be falling around you? You can panic, cower in fear, weep and wail, or shake your fist at heaven. Sometimes we do all those things. But the best thing I know to do is to trust the Lord who reminds us that when we stay rooted in Him and in His love, that we are unshakeable and unrootable. I think that was what Paul was trying to say when he said, “We are more than conquerors through Christ who loves us.”
– Dr. Tim Thompson