A couple of days ago, a friend in ministry, who is a lot younger than I, died. He and I shared a room together in a retreat several decades ago.  Since then, we kept in contact periodically.  He’s a faithful man of God and gave all his heart and mind to serving Him.  He’s healthy with no known serious illness but God in His infinite mercy decided to call him home.  That’s heaven’s perspective, and we must not let it slip our eyes whenever tragedy strikes.  But we are also mindful of the fact that we still live on earth, so we can’t help but see this loss through our earthly lens.  For the family he left behind, more than a storm, this is a hurricane; and they are in the eye of the hurricane.

The eye of the hurricane is where winds and rain are the strongest.  At times God leads us to the eye of the hurricane of trouble, but as David exclaims, “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You will revive me” (Psalm 138:7). Please take note of that word, revive.  Not only are we beaten by the storms, but we are also almost dead. In fact, we are already dead—at least emotionally.  We’ve been there before; we saw no hope, felt lifeless; we’re like zombies, doing our chores without purpose.  There in the eye of the hurricane, in the center of trouble, Christ was there, as always, and He revived us.

In his book, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, Pastor Eugene Peterson recounts the last days of Dietrich Bonhoeffer as written in the report of the prison doctor at Flossenburg, where he’s serving time for speaking out against Adolf Hitler.  Bonhoeffer, a pastor, knelt in fervent prayer on the wee morning hour of April 9, 1945.  Seeing that, the doctor wrote that it “moved me to the depths.”  The prison guards then ordered all the prisoners to be executed to strip and led them to a secluded place.  Five minutes before he was killed, Bonhoeffer once again knelt to pray.  Although he’s in the eye of the storms, he’s calm; he knew he’s at the center of God’s love.

Pastor Paul