Storms and Rain

We are about to drown in Southeast Arkansas. Seriously, I have never seen the Saline river so high. It is to the top of the bridge and we are fore casted to have more rain this weekend and week. Surely it won't go over the bridge! On Wednesday we had a F1 tornado go through our town. A pretty scary morning for a lot of people. Lots of trees on houses, cars, and across roads and lots of power lines down. I think by Friday pretty much everyone had power back. But the aftermath of the damage will be here for a long time. We were blessed in our county not to have any fatalities that day. The storm hit about 5 in the morning. I hadn't gotten much sleep that night because at about 1:30am I heard thunder off in the distance and saw the bad weather we were going to have later. I just don't like bad weather and I sure don't want to sleep through it and not be able to hold my babies if I need too. I spent all night on the couch with the tv on with one eye closed and one eye on the tv. Then it happened. I dozed off for a little bit. I woke up for some reason and saw the warning on the tv for our county and they were talking about it. Then the phone rang and Ned Perme was calling to say there was a tornado warning for my area. No more than 2 minutes later the wind picked up and the thunder and lightening was crazy loud. Barry had already gotten up and we were piling pillows and blankets and a flashlight into the bathroom and each of us grabbed a kid and hunkered down. My hubby has given up arguing and questioning me. He just submits when it comes to this. Not a battle worth fighting to him. We waited it out for 30 minutes and got out to check the radar to see if it was done. The boys were wide eyed by then wanting to know what in the world was going on. Thankfully my boys are easy when it comes to bedtime and they went right back to sleep. I was exhausted by then and wanted to crash but the night wasn't over for us just yet. Hubby was on call this week so the phone started ringing like crazy. Trees on gas meters and houses and blowing mains oh my! So off he went into the aftermath and unknown. I spent a good 2 hours praying that my man come home with every hair on his head he left with, unharmed, and every finger and toe still in place. I have learned you have to be very specific to the Lord or He just may not get what you want.:o) Not the first tornado my hubby has had to go in and clean up after. He went to the one on Dumas too. Just makes me nervous though. He got a call from a police officer that smelled gas while driving down the road. They weren't sure where it was. Sure in the pouring rain with lightening still shooting in every direction hubby can find that leak in an unknown location. Well he did and it was a meter by the road under a tree shooting gas straight into the air. He gets out into a ditch full of water and power lines down to stop it so there is no explosion. He says I took one for the team and chanced it. Man I am serious. We don't have enough life insurance. I think I may need to do some checking on that soon!!! Any way later in the day the sun came out and it was beautiful. The calm after the storm was here. I lost my sanity for a moment and let the boys go outside into our flooded yard and play. The storm blew the lid off the sandbox and it was full of water which they loved. God gives us storms. We can choose to walk through them with Him and reach the other side in His arms or try to go around them and fail and fall away from God or we will go through the storm with Him never reach the other side but be with Him by His side for eternity. The first and last are awesome to me. I don't want to go around the storm. I learn from each one that is in my path. Don't always want too but know I need it. And the storm is always worth being closer to my God.