Awaiting Irene….where are the asps?

I think many of us are feeling a little beleaguered by all of the bad news as of late.  I know I am!  From tornado’s to earthquakes to now hurricanes, the past week in the Northern corridor has been nothing short of interesting.  Fortunately, the prior two didn’t create a whole lot of damage, it was more the strangeness of the event that caught our attention.  But, I guess in fairness, it is our turn.  We have been watching our fellow countrymen and other areas of the world get completely slammed by Mother Nature so we shouldn’t be surprised when this misfortune comes our way.  It is all in the way you handle it.  A little “God helps those who help themselves” goes a long way.  At least in the case of hurricanes where you get fair warning.I have several family members who are right in the line of the hurricane.  One has been under a hurricane warning since last night, the other is suppose to be very close to the eye.  The one is fine and has weathered many a storm, but the other, well I am hoping for evacuation.On top of all of these weather events that can’t be controlled came some local bad news.  A couple of companies closing and a beloved bakery burned down.  It was the bakery that finally got every ones spirits down.  I mean, if this isn’t as my friend said, a “sign of end times” then what is?  Of course I joke, but there is something in that joke that makes one pause.  Do I think we are at end times, who knows…who cares!  We have work to do in the here and now.  If we are then, ok, like I told him, get your spiritual affairs in order.   But I think it is more like we are in “bad” times.  I think all the reading that I do helps me to keep these times in perspective.  For example, I am reading Ken Follets “Pillars of the Earth”…cheerful stuff.  🙂  But those were seriously hard times.  Where people wandered from place to place in search of food and shelter and work, on bad roads.  I just finished reading a fluffy trilogy about Pride and Prejudice called the Fitzwilliam Darcy Series, but even in there you can see just how hard life was if you weren’t part of the gentry.So, I guess for me, I have to cling to hope.  Everything seems to be going in the wrong direction.  We seem to be edging closer and closer to despair.  But just as with the hurricane, it is all how you handle the warnings, so too, with despair, it is all how you handle it.  There is no despair in God.  There is only hope in promises yet to be fulfilled and faith in promises that have already been fulfilled.  Does that mean we stand still and “hope” that God comes through??  No, it means that we work in relationship with God to live a life of hope for others to see.  If we despair, how are we illuminating Christ (who lets face it, didn’t have it easy)? The good news is, that Manny’s cheesecake will go on.  That is what the owner said…hey that was hopeful!  The human spirit is a wonderful thing to behold.Please keep all of those to be affected by the hurricane in your prayers.  This could be a huge impact.  And thanks for checking in!Here is a link if you have no idea what I am talking about.  www.weather.com