Anyone whose home has burned will understand my feelings when I came home for lunch one day, just after Christmas, and opened my door to a black cloud billowing out that nearly knocked me over. Oh my gosh! My house was on fire!
It was flu season, I was getting it, and all I wanted was a quiet lunch hour before returning to work. I forgot the flu and the quiet lunch hour was not to be. Neighbors came over and some of the guys covered their faces and ran in to get furniture. The sofa sitting in the snow looked a bit funny when the firemen got there. Where were my cats? My handmade ornaments on my tree were blackened out of recognition. Funny the things you think about in a crisis!
As it turned out, my house did not burn down. The kitchen and bath were gutted. The smoke damage looked like filigree cobwebs over gray and black shadows everywhere I looked, and water damage was unavoidable as well. Everything just plain stank. But all was not lost.
We made it through that disaster. In the following months while the mess was cleaned up and the house restored to living conditions again, somehow provisions came in. Money arrived from unexpected sources, a couple of kitchen showers replaced what was lost there, and we were able to occupy a rental house down the street for the few months needed that assured the kids would continue to go to school and live and play in their own neighborhood.
God says He will be with us through fire and water. We won’t drown in water, and through the fire, our belongings may stink, but we ourselves won’t even be scorched. Look to the New Year with confidence.
“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you” Isaiah 43:2.
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