In the Gaze of Dean

For two Mid-Atlantic transplants living in the Midwest, hurricanes were at most a thing of curiosity. They were the stuff of late summer Weather channel reports. Devastating and cruel to be sure but never in our version of reality. They were events that happened to others. All of that is changing in the face of the now Category 4 Hurricane Dean.

As I am writing this update, Hurricane Dean is now bearing down on Jamaica, and all of the projections place its trajectory directly across the Yucatan Peninsula and the city of Mérida. The entire state of Yucatan is under yellow alert meaning that preparation on everyone’s mind as shoppers filled the supermarkets stocking up on canned food, water, and medicine.

Here in our new home as well we are preparing–determining areas of safety, and trying to make our plans, but even as we plan, we are faced with a mountain of uncertainty and where there is uncertainty, not far behind we find fear.

In all of this I am reminded of that tumultuous voyage of Jesus’ disciples across the Sea of Galilee in Mark chapter 4. There there were being tossed about, grown, sea-hardened fishermen uncertain if they would live or die. As they woke Jesus, who had been sleeping on a cushion, they wondered aloud if he even cared about them. In their fear, they’d failed to recognize that he was the one who had ordered them to set sail in the first place. The storm, more than the setting of a miracle, was their opportunity to recognize that, even though they went through the valley of the shadow of death, they had nothing to fear because with them was their shepherd.

Pray for us friends. Pray for our safety and for the safety of friends in harm’s way. Pray too though that we won’t fail to recognize the presence of our Good Shepherd as we wait here in the gaze of Hurricane Dean.