
My wife grew up in Louisville, Mississippi (pronounced Lewis-ville by the residents). Her parents still live there. Last week a category F4 tornado ripped through the town. The extent of the devastation is sweeping. Monday I went with a group of guys to deliver supplies from BCC and to help with the cleanup. It looks like someone dropped a mile wide finger from the sky and dragged it across their town. We were clearing debris at a home that was stubbornly refusing to fall all the way to its knees when the homeowner stopped by to survey the remains again. She insisted on leading us on a tour. She pointed to where trees used to be. She took a group inside and tried to explain how the rooms had been arranged. She showed them the hallway where she and her daughter prayed while the storm pulled trees from her yard, laid them against her house, and stole away with most of her roof. When they crawled out of the hallway she found all the furniture flung about the house, the cabinets opened and emptied, and glass everywhere. She led them to a plate of cookies on the kitchen counter. The cookies were the only things in the entire house that did not move in the storm. “I don’t know what that means,” she said. She paused to reflect again, smiled, and then continued the tour. Tragedies force that on us. They force us to think about meaning. We’ll look for it anywhere, even in a plate of cookies. We want something solid to cling to, something unchanging, something that can’t be moved when our lives have been blown off their foundations and the contents strewn in front of us to be inventoried, analyzed, and counted. Almost losing your life forces you to take stock. A storm like the one that rampaged through Louisville rips open your life and shows you what is most important to you. It makes you ask, “Is there anything that can’t be moved? Have I invested in that?” Why does it take a storm, an earthquake, or some other tragedy to wake us up to hear the still small voice of the Rock? If only it weren’t so. I beg you to take inventory now! What is important? What can’t be taken away from you? Where are you storing up your treasure? Grace & Peace, Chris