Daily Devotional for Tuesday September 28, 2004

Going through the Eye of the Hurricane and Talking with God

(Deuteronomy 10:1; Psalms 2:11; John 13:14)

This past Sunday was one of the more challenging days in my life, and for me was a day of great personal revelation. Back on August 13th, Hurricane Charley was bearing down on the greater Tampa Bay area on the west coast of Florida where the Liveprayer offices are located. Just an hour prior to taking a direct hit, the storm made an abrupt turn east and into the west coast of Florida 120 miles to the south of us. The densely populated Tampa Bay area was spared, but Charley cut a path through the central part of Florida leaving death and destruction in its wake.

Just a few weeks later, it was Hurricane Frances. The initial track of Frances showed it going up the eastern seaboard, but it eventually turned west and entered Florida just north of West Palm Beach slowly making its way across the Florida peninsula, eventually passing to the north of Tampa, again causing death and much destruction along its path. We were not very well prepared for Frances since it was on the east coast and predicted to not be much of a problem to our area. But it was during Frances we lost power at one of our technical offices, then blew the engine on the generator at that office causing Liveprayer to be down for approximately 30 hours.

Within a week of Frances, it was time for Hurricane Ivan. Again, this storm was predicted to make land in the Tampa Bay area. Preparations were made, but as the days passed, the storm moved further out into the Gulf and, of course, eventually hit the Florida Panhandle around Pensacola, again causing many deaths and billions of dollars worth of property damage. After making its way through many of the southern states, Ivan then split, and part of Ivan retraced its way back out into the Gulf and has been a problem for those on the east coast of Texas.

While Ivan was causing its damage, Hurricane Jeanne was tearing through Haiti, killing over 1,000 people and destroying much of that island. It, then, literally sat and did nothing for many days, looking like it was going to stay out in the Atlantic. Late last week, it slowly began to move west, but all models and tracks as late as Friday had it going up the east coast of Florida into the Carolinas. By Saturday, it looked like Jeanne would make land on the east coast of Florida and track up the center of the state. Incredibly, as it came on shore Saturday night almost at the exact point Hurricane Frances did, Jeanne began to take a track west through the state, on a line that would bring it right over Tampa Sunday afternoon which is exactly what happened.

I wanted to detail these 4 hurricanes we have experienced over the past 6 weeks since I have been inundated with emails asking me if I thought this was some form of God?s judgment. I can assure you of one thing my friend, when God begins to exercise His judgment you will not have to ask that question, it will be obvious! While nothing happens that God does not allow, and no man knows the mind of God, these hurricanes are simply a by-product of fallen nature. Here is a paragraph from my 8/14/04 Devotional on this very issue: ?At the time God created this environment we lived in, there were NO tornadoes, hurricanes, lightning, typhoons, floods, earthquakes, or other acts of destruction by nature. These acts of nature are often referred to now as acts of God. That is a very misleading statement. God does allow these acts of nature to occur but these were NOT His intended actions for the environment He created man to live in. A consequence of the fall of man due to sin, was a fall of his environment.?

I can tell you that I was not really prepared for Hurricane Jeanne yesterday. We had little time to do much in the way of securing the Liveprayer facilities, and having just taken down all of our hurricane shutters earlier in the week, my home was not going to be protected from whatever Jeanne would bring. Having dodged the worst part of the previous 3 hurricanes, we caught the full brunt of Jeanne with sustained winds of 40 mph for over 24 hours, gusts over 70 mph at times, along with lots of rain as the eye passed just to the north of Tampa Sunday afternoon.

None of the offices of Liveprayer lost power, had any problems with the phone lines, and all of Liveprayer functioned normally. The volume of incoming prayer requests goes up on Sundays, and we received and responded to over 45,000 prayer requests this past Sunday, the Daily Devotional went out on schedule, and the website, including the ?live? video feed was up every second. Other than several large trees that were uprooted, my home went through the storm without any problems. PRAISE GOD!

From 10 p.m. Saturday night through 3 a.m. Monday morning, I spent an incredible amount of time with the Lord in His Word and in prayer. Even in the midst of the gusting winds and the pounding rain, I had a peace and calm that I cannot even put into words. The one message I kept getting from God throughout these many hours was this, ?When are you going to take your service for Me to the next level? I am waiting for you.? I remember agonizing over what God was saying to me, telling God all I had was His, what more could I give Him. Here is what God said, ?You have more, I want it all!?

I love you and care about you so much. You will never know how deeply I appreciate the love, prayers, and concern for me and my family and for Liveprayer throughout these past 6 weeks. It has been a very special source of strength and comfort for me. While we can never know the mind of God, and knowing that nothing happens God does not allow, I reject that these hurricanes are anything but the normal activities of a fallen nature. However, God can use these types of events to speak to people.

I sit here this morning and realize that God was trying to speak to me through the first 3 hurricanes and I really wasn?t listening. However, Sunday, He made sure to get my attention and force me to hear what He had to say. His words, ?You have more, I want it all!? are still ringing in my ears and in my Spirit. The fact is, God is right. I do have more. I am spending the next few days in prayer, focused on what I have to do to take my service to the Lord to the next level.

I am praying for you today. The reality is, you have more also. You are not doing everything you can to be serving the Lord, you have more and God wants it. I want to challenge you today. Take some time over the next few days, get alone with the Lord for several hours, and just pray, spend some time in His Word, and let God speak to you. We only have one life. When it is over, it is over. Christ gave everything He had during His life, and as followers of His that should be our goal as well.

Sadly, it often takes major events in our life to stop long enough to listen to God?s voice. The death of a loved one, the loss of our job, a natural disaster like a hurricane. I am grateful that God loves us enough to speak to us. I thank Him today for speaking to me so clearly over these past few hours. He is right, I do have more to give to His service and I am going to make sure that I give it all to Him. I pray today that you will make that same commitment. More than anything else, this world needs men and women who love the Lord, sold out, giving everything they have to serving our King!