Priase You in this Storm

Rebecca and I rode out the storm almost wondering why it was so calm at our house. As we ate dinner and watched the live stream of a Tornado, it was like watching a movie, yet going through areas just miles from our house. Relative to other areas we were never really in danger. It barely rained, the wind was not bad, and we never lost power. As we watched we knew so many people were hurting, yet what could we do? As the pictures and videos rolled in, the destruction we knew would be there was now evident on our TV. "Warzone," "bomb exploded," "destroyed," were as common phrases as "what's for dinner?" These type of images and phrases are pretty frequent on a global scale, but to realize how close it is to you and how it easily could have been you, puts it in a whole new perspective.

Why were there lives thrown into an uproar and mine spared is such an easy question to conclude. I have to remind myself that we all deserve this and much more, and we will all face this in one way or another. Our sinful nature will ultimately lead to eternal destruction and turmoil if not for the saving grace of Jesus Christ. The destruction from the storms paints such a clear picture to me of how putting our hope in anything else can be taken away in a minute. Houses, cars, and other possessions that people spend their whole lives working for can instantly become worthless. Having these things is fine, but how much more valuable to invest time in loving God and loving people.

I woke up this morning planning on going to work like any other day. I am behind on my yards from the bad weather so I was anxious to get caught up. While I was eating breakfast, I scrolled through the news photos and each one striking at my heart. I continued on to my parents house, but felt so weird about taking care of mostly cosmetic needs from my customers, when there were so many who had real needs that were much more pressing. My dad is on the chainsaw team of the Birmingham Baptist Association Disaster Relief Team and was meeting up with them this morning. I debated in my mind for just a minute more, and then decided to tag along with them for the day.  My yards were such that they can wait another day, so I made myself available to help. One of the benefits of being self-employed is the ability to be able to do this. I'm so glad I was able to help even if it only was to a few people.

Here's a map to show how close the houses with massive destruction were to my parents

The really bad areas of town that are constantly on the news are not open to volunteer relief yet because they are still in first responder search and rescue mode. So we went to four houses over the course of the day that are so close to my parents house, yet by the destruction felt like a different world. All of them had numerous trees down in their yard and on their house. As volunteers we aren't allowed to work on trees that are affecting the house for insurance purposes, but everything else is fair game. The association has a trailer full of chainsaws and we got to work. All the houses we went to were extremely grateful. You can sense their sheer overwhelmed feeling from the destruction and the relief to see somebody come to help. Again it points you to the gospel of being overwhelmed by your sin, and there is a perfect Savior willing to help you.

Pines, oaks, sweetgums, tulip poplars, it didn't matter the type of tree, they were possible victims. Here are just a few photos from our days activities and other houses around. There is still so much more work to be done.

A good reminder to move my car away from trees during a storm

This guy told me he was asleep when this happened

Tim Herrington showed up at the last house with a food trailer to feed the neighborhood. A great time of fellowship to lots of people hurting.

One Year Anniversary

I am a few days behind in posting. While we were at the beach, you had to go park in front of the condo office to get internet. So using the internet meant sacrificing time with the family.

So our official anniversary was on May 9th. We combined our anniversary with Matt's triathlon at the beach. The family left on Monday and we stayed til Tuesday. Amongst all the anniversary talk Rebecca brainstormed ideas on a tradition we could do every year on our anniversary.

• One obvious one for us and fairly easy, is to take a picture of ourselves. Matt suggested we could spice that up a little bit by taking it in a different state each year, so after 50 years of marriage we would have covered every state. An intriguing idea and one I would love to accomplish. I'm afraid the first few years we'll have to knock out the Southeastern states if we go that route. Florida is off the list. 

• Another idea was to write a letter to each other every year. Also a great idea and which I actually did today. I hope I strive to do that more frequently than once a year though. 

I think that's all we came up with. If we think of something else in the next week or so we'll still count it for this year.

As for what we actually did for our anniversary we had a full day. We drove over to SanDestin to the outlet mall. Rebecca had some graduation money and a lack of "adult outfits" so she solved that problem. We took the scenic drive back to the condo in Panama City and stopped in Seaside where we took our "anniversary" picture. Its such a neat little community and a much more appealing way to me to spend time at the beach than big resort towns. We ate dinner at The Red Bar a local 'hole-in-the-wall' favorite, where there are only 5 choices on the dinner menu. 

As far as anniversary presents, we are going to take an 'I owe you' and spend the money on Rebecca's plane ticket to California in August so she can go with me to the American Society for Horticulture Science conference. 

I also wanted to take a moment to speak on marriage. Here is a small excerpt from the letter I wrote Rebecca:

It has been said many times by several people, "I can't believe it has been a year already."    While this is true I'm glad it is not the opposite because it seems the 'slow' aspects in life are the less favorable ones. So in that regard, I am not surprised nor disappointed it has gone by so quickly, because that indicates to me all the more how great it has been.

Society is quick to dismiss marriage as primarily negative and I do my best to steer away from adding to the perception simply because in my one year of experience that has not been the case. While there have certainly been some rough patches, the overwhelming majority of the past year has been wonderful. I get to spend everyday with my best friend who makes me laugh, think, and strive to be a better person.

The thing that has set Rebecca apart from any other person I know and what confirmed to me she was the girl God had deemed for me to marry was the fact that I feel I can be my true self around her. For better or worse she loves the best aspects of me and puts up with the not so great. It is such a freeing feeling to have someone that knows you inside and out and isn't scared to death of you.

To me it is such a reflection of our salvation we have in Christ as believers. Christianity get labeled as a bunch of rules, limiting your 'freedom' as a human being when it is just the opposite. Becoming a Christian is not meant to bond you to a set of rules but rather free you from the bondage of sin. Sure, sin can sometimes be fun and appealing, but in the end it leads to death. Sin is such a temporary 'freedom' and is appealing as a temporary fix. It is like a drug in the fact that a little only satisfies for a short period and thus more is required to quench that sinful desire. The bible constantly describes sin as being a slave and salvation as freedom (Romans 6:16, Galatians 5:1). Freedom in sin is just an allusion and you are actually just a slave to something else. My pastor, J.D., made those two points in a recent sermon and then quoted the Bob Dylan song "Gotta Serve Somebody." If you feel you are free in your sin, think again. You are slave to something whether it be money, women, job, kids, or your status. Salvation offers an eternal freedom (Romans 6:22), where you can live life as it was truly meant to live.

When I look at my life before marriage and this past year of marriage I am amazed at this picture of the salvation we have in Christ. During the dating scene I was constantly putting up fronts to make myself look more impressive and do what I thought would be more attractive to the females around me . I was a slave to this, just as we are slaves to sin before we are saved. When Rebecca came along I certainly tried the same methods (trying to earn salvation), but after a while she, no doubt, could begin to see the real me ( a few positive things, but mostly my sinful nature) yet she loved me all the more (Romans 5:8). When you realize this phenomenon, it does not make you want to continue to serve the "dating image" but serve your girlfriend/wife. You are free to love her not in order to earn her love in return, but because you realize she loves you no matter what you have done. To me that makes me want to be a better person in all aspects, because she has been so good to me. Marriage is not I love you because you are great and can meet all my needs, rather I love you in spite of all your weaknesses and I will trust God to meet all my needs.

It is almost comical how the world portrays this just the opposite, as the dating scene being the free zone and marriage as the 'ball and chain' (slavery). I argue it is just the opposite. I am now free to love my wife in a way that wasn't possible before marriage and I want to serve her not out of fear of rejection, but because she loves me even when she should reject me.

Like so many aspects in life, this is another example of how God uses things on Earth to point us to the picture of salvation and how salvation show us how we are to live out things on Earth. (Ephesians 5:25)

I had no intention of a post this long, but once I got going I couldn't stop.