Storms and God, Meteorology and Metaphor

Sandy took me by surprise. Not the wind, rain, flooding, and snow, not the power outages--these were clearly coming, and there wasn't much to do but watch. No, what took me by surprise was the feelings it brought up from Rita and Katrina when we lived north of Houston and the derecho winds that ripped through Virginia this summer.

Some responses come naturally. You get to know your neighbors. You share tools, propane, and tips on where to find ice. You cook meals, if you have power, for those fleeing a flooded Ninth Ward or who ran out of gas on the evacuation route. The clean-up is just work. You cut up and cart off branches, repair the shed, call insurance for the roof, and discard spoiled food. You share chain saws, shovels, and rakes. Being without power when it's hot out is miserable. You open windows, sleep downstairs, hope for a breeze. Being without power when it's freezing is even worse.

This is where those feelings I mentioned come in--not the pragmatic, "let's just get it done" things that take over while you're getting the yard in shape or cleaning out the freezer, but the feeling of powerlessness, the awe of staring into the face of nature's God and feeling incompetent, the paralysis of the fly trapped in the spider's web. The lack of electricity blurs the line between the metaphorical and mechanical. The mechanics of storm response are manageable. The metaphorics of powerlessness, less so.

No wonder people in crisis look over their shoulder for signs of God! And I suppose it's no surprise that the God we find can seem capricious, arbitrary, unpredictable, mean.

But one thing I'm only now beginning to understand is that the place to listen for God's call throughout the crisis isn't in the wind, the rain, the earthquake, or the fire. It's in the needs that emerge in the silence. And as Elijah discovered so long ago, the silence always follows the storm. God finds us, like Elijah, doing all the practical things to save our own life and then calls us from our isolation to serve the common good.

So, where is God when 16 so far have died? Calling us to help. Where is God when 6 million at last count are without power? Calling us to empower.

Some will wrongly see God's judgment in natural disasters, and the list of ills the storms address will correspond to the evils the interpreter already sees in society. But this isn't a time to look for judgment or to assign blame. It's a time to look for grace and by our actions pass it on.

If you want to make an immediate difference through the church, I invite you to write a check to the church and designate it to Week of Compassion emergency relief. Like Spirit of Joy's Blessing Quarters, 100% of designated moneys go to fund needed assistance, blankets, clean water, food, medical supplies, hygiene kits, shelter. Week of Compassion is always among the first on the ground responding to natural disasters, both here and through ecumenical partnerships around the world.

You can't completely overcome feelings of powerlessness when the storm clouds roll in and the wind begins to blow. But in the calm silence that follows, you can be part of the empowerment of recovery and restoration, one blanket at a time. And as a wider church community, we'll weather every storm together.