There had been the usual spring indications of potential severe weather here in Middle Tennessee from the usual places.
The National Weather Service, Accuweather, The Weather Channel, and, of course, the local TV network weather teams, with their clever catchphrases, had all issued alarming weather warnings for a couple of days. But this wasn’t unusual.
Every spring, severe weather aims for the greater Tennessee River Valley. From the Ohio River to the Gulf of Mexico, gigantic thunderstorms called supercells grow towering into the atmosphere, nearly touching the thermosphere at 75,000 feet. Underneath these behemoths, tornadoes occasionally spawn like twirling malignant devils.
And so it was last week when a supercell aimed at us here in Maury County, Tennessee, south of Nashville. It wasn’t our first rodeo. As I mentioned, nearly every spring brings one or two days when the warnings sound, and we batten down the hatches. As the storms crossed the Mississippi River to our southwest, I gave them my usual casual attention on this day.
I switched to our local weather as the storms drew closer because they had better local radar. One supercell to the southwest caught my attention. At one point, they showed the long-term track of this storm. I paused the TV and laid a ruler along the track to see where it was heading. The future track passed right over our house. But I wasn’t really worried. The Word tells us that fear and worry are the opposite of faith. Still, I kicked my boat shoes off, reached for socks, and slipped on my hiking boots. Better to have them and not need them than to need them and not have them on.
As it turned out, this supercell produced an F3 tornado that touched down a few thousand feet just to our west and moved northeast across our front. Almost as soon as it hit, the power went out and stayed out for two days. My grandson, wife, and I watched the howling monster from our ridge-top front porch as it passed a mile to the north.
The tornado damaged or destroyed over two hundred homes, including the home of the mother of our next-door neighbor, who lived on the next ridge to the north. She was fine, but her home was destroyed. Across the street from her, another homeowner was killed when the 175-mile-per-hour winds pulled their house apart. That home simply disappeared.
My son and daughter-in-law live a few miles east, and their home was near the end of the tornado’s track. As the twirling winds died, all manner of debris from the life of the storm dropped onto their three acres of property.
Despite the violence and destruction of the storm and the fury of the fifteen minutes of the tornado’s passing, this is a story of peace. God’s peace. At no time did I feel we were in any danger. Despite the storm’s potential track, both my wife and I felt a sense of calm. Yes, we prayed, but more than prayer, we simply rested in God’s peace. And yes, I did trade my boat shoes for hiking boots, but that was more because I was a Boy Scout than anything else. “Be Prepared” is one of the greatest lessons the Scouts taught me.
The tornado missed us by a whisker. We were fortunate and blessed. But beyond that, we had a chance to experience the absolute wonder of God’s sweet calm and peace in the middle of chaos. We rested in His love, and all was well.
When the world’s storms threaten to sweep over you, find and rest in the quiet oasis of God’s love.
(Photo courtesy of pixabay and Roonznl.)
Kevin Spencer likes to play with words, help others play with them, and is privileged to be a staff writer for Christian Devotions. He lives with his beautiful blessing of a wife, Charlotte, and his amazing collegiate grandson, Caleb.