Last night, my 3-year-old requested some stories from her Bible before bed. We started with Jesus bringing the little girl back to life (one of my daughter’s favorites) and ended with Jesus calming the storm. As I read the familiar account, the Holy Spirit prompted me to consider something I hadn’t before: The disciples, fisherman all their lives, had faced plenty of other storms. The one that churned out of the blue that day created wind and waves so unprecedented, the seasoned sailors cried, “We are lost!”
A similar sense of dread filled my own heart Monday night as Hurricane Harvey’s floodwaters lapped over the curbs on our street and inched toward our front door. For the last 48 hours, I’d listened to television news anchors and Houston-area officials use the word “unprecedented” countless times. Overuse rendered it almost meaningless until paired with statistics: 52 inches of rain, 13,000...
