CHRIST THE LORD IN RISEN!! HALLELUJAH!
Monday, April 25, 2011
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
The Starfish Story
I heard this story the other day and just wanted to share...
While walking along a beach, an elderly gentleman saw someone in the distance leaning down, picking something up and throwing it into the ocean.
As he got closer, he noticed that the figure was that of a young man, picking up starfish one by one and tossing each one gently back into the water.
He came closer still and called out, “Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?”
The young man paused, looked up, and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean.”
The old man smiled, and said, “I must ask, then, why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?”
To this, the young man replied, “The sun is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them in, they’ll die.”
Upon hearing this, the elderly observer commented, “But, young man, do you not realize that there are miles and miles of beach and there are starfish all along every mile? You can’t possibly make a difference!”
The young man listened politely. Then he bent down, picked up another starfish, threw it into the ocean past the breaking waves and said, “It made a difference for that one.”
Monday, April 18, 2011
This is NC, we don't have tornadoes
We had 62 tornadoes in North Carolina on Saturday! Say WHAT??
I know. Crazy. So let me start from the beginning. I was at a Leadership conference Friday night and all day Saturday. I went with some ladies from our church and we met with ladies from all over the state at a church not too far from my house. We had known all week that the weather was supposed to be bad on Saturday afternoon with a possible threat of tornadoes. That is extremely rare for our state, we NEVER get tornadoes. As part of our conference we broke up into small groups to do projects around the area. My team was assigned to work at a place in Fuquay which is the town I live in. It's about a 20 minute drive from the church where the conference was. So we all loaded up in a 15 passenger van around 1pm to head to our work site. The weather at that point was the same it had been all morning, it was cloudy and windy but nothing to be concerned about and it was definitely not raining yet. So we worked for about two hours and started loading up the van around 3pm to head back to the church in Apex. Before we could pull out of the driveway our leader's daughter called and said that we should start heading back right away because the bad weather was very close and we needed to take shelter. We had not gotten five minutes down the road when another lady's husband called and said there was a tornado headed right toward Apex! That's where we were headed! I was slightly scared to say the least. At this point it had started raining really hard and the wind was blowing our van back and forth pretty hard. I texted Kyle to make sure everything was OK at the house and told him I loved him just in case anything happened to me. I was half kidding but half very serious because I was scared! On the drive back to the church we went though the town of Holly Springs (at approx 3:15pm) which I drive through pretty much on a daily basis and it would be the same way I would drive back through on my way home later that night. By the time we got back to the church the weather was severe and the power in the church was already flickering. We were all ushered down into the church's basement and oddly enough, we carried on with our retreat!! For the next hour we heard the rain and hail beating against the building and sirens going off everywhere! It was crazy I tell you!! It's (sort of) comical now but at the time it was somewhat annoying when one lady who just moved here from Texas asked if what we were hearing was a tornado siren going off. Not realizing she was serious and not trying to be funny, I was sarcastically thinking to myself "We don't have tornado sirens in North Carolina because we don't have tornadoes." Anyway, we ended the retreat and as I came back upstairs I noticed that it was incredibly eery, quiet and calm outside. It was so strange. I remember being 10 years old and experiencing Hurricane Fran when she came through. I remember that same eery feeling being in the eye of that storm and it felt the same way! It was freaky. As I drove back home the same way I had just driven through two hours earlier, everything looked the same until I got to Holly Springs. I immediately knew something was very, very wrong. There was a whole line of trees and street signs completely toppled over. There was no power to any of the traffic lights and fire trucks were trying to block off lanes where trees were all over the road. I called Kyle and he said we had no power at the house. I knew why! A tornado had come through that area for sure! After getting home and looking online to see what in the world was going on, we discovered that a tornado had indeed come through Holly Springs at approximately 3:30pm. Holy moly! That was only about 15 minutes after our van of ladies had driven through that very area. Not to mention, that same area is only about 4 miles away from our house. We had missed that tornado by mere minutes and mere miles. I was so freaked out I couldn't even sit down. I was pacing around the dark house for a good little bit before I could calm down enough to call anyone. I was talking so fast I don't even know how Kyle could understand anything I was saying. We finally got power back a couple of hours later. Unfortunately a lot of people are still without power in Holly Springs and many other areas around NC that were hit. Governor Bev Perdue said we had a total of 62 tornadoes that afternoon and has declared a state of emergency. The death toll is currently at 25. As thankful as I am that nothing happened to me or my family, my heart is breaking even more for those who were hit and those families that lost loved ones. I can not say it enough people, you NEVER know when your last day might be. We are not promised a tomorrow. In just a few seconds, your whole life can turn upside down.
It just didn't seem right that yesterday morning we woke up to beautiful sunny skies and 70 degree weather. You would have never guessed that just 18 hours before, our state saw the worst weather conditions we have seen in years. CRAZY!
I know. Crazy. So let me start from the beginning. I was at a Leadership conference Friday night and all day Saturday. I went with some ladies from our church and we met with ladies from all over the state at a church not too far from my house. We had known all week that the weather was supposed to be bad on Saturday afternoon with a possible threat of tornadoes. That is extremely rare for our state, we NEVER get tornadoes. As part of our conference we broke up into small groups to do projects around the area. My team was assigned to work at a place in Fuquay which is the town I live in. It's about a 20 minute drive from the church where the conference was. So we all loaded up in a 15 passenger van around 1pm to head to our work site. The weather at that point was the same it had been all morning, it was cloudy and windy but nothing to be concerned about and it was definitely not raining yet. So we worked for about two hours and started loading up the van around 3pm to head back to the church in Apex. Before we could pull out of the driveway our leader's daughter called and said that we should start heading back right away because the bad weather was very close and we needed to take shelter. We had not gotten five minutes down the road when another lady's husband called and said there was a tornado headed right toward Apex! That's where we were headed! I was slightly scared to say the least. At this point it had started raining really hard and the wind was blowing our van back and forth pretty hard. I texted Kyle to make sure everything was OK at the house and told him I loved him just in case anything happened to me. I was half kidding but half very serious because I was scared! On the drive back to the church we went though the town of Holly Springs (at approx 3:15pm) which I drive through pretty much on a daily basis and it would be the same way I would drive back through on my way home later that night. By the time we got back to the church the weather was severe and the power in the church was already flickering. We were all ushered down into the church's basement and oddly enough, we carried on with our retreat!! For the next hour we heard the rain and hail beating against the building and sirens going off everywhere! It was crazy I tell you!! It's (sort of) comical now but at the time it was somewhat annoying when one lady who just moved here from Texas asked if what we were hearing was a tornado siren going off. Not realizing she was serious and not trying to be funny, I was sarcastically thinking to myself "We don't have tornado sirens in North Carolina because we don't have tornadoes." Anyway, we ended the retreat and as I came back upstairs I noticed that it was incredibly eery, quiet and calm outside. It was so strange. I remember being 10 years old and experiencing Hurricane Fran when she came through. I remember that same eery feeling being in the eye of that storm and it felt the same way! It was freaky. As I drove back home the same way I had just driven through two hours earlier, everything looked the same until I got to Holly Springs. I immediately knew something was very, very wrong. There was a whole line of trees and street signs completely toppled over. There was no power to any of the traffic lights and fire trucks were trying to block off lanes where trees were all over the road. I called Kyle and he said we had no power at the house. I knew why! A tornado had come through that area for sure! After getting home and looking online to see what in the world was going on, we discovered that a tornado had indeed come through Holly Springs at approximately 3:30pm. Holy moly! That was only about 15 minutes after our van of ladies had driven through that very area. Not to mention, that same area is only about 4 miles away from our house. We had missed that tornado by mere minutes and mere miles. I was so freaked out I couldn't even sit down. I was pacing around the dark house for a good little bit before I could calm down enough to call anyone. I was talking so fast I don't even know how Kyle could understand anything I was saying. We finally got power back a couple of hours later. Unfortunately a lot of people are still without power in Holly Springs and many other areas around NC that were hit. Governor Bev Perdue said we had a total of 62 tornadoes that afternoon and has declared a state of emergency. The death toll is currently at 25. As thankful as I am that nothing happened to me or my family, my heart is breaking even more for those who were hit and those families that lost loved ones. I can not say it enough people, you NEVER know when your last day might be. We are not promised a tomorrow. In just a few seconds, your whole life can turn upside down.
It just didn't seem right that yesterday morning we woke up to beautiful sunny skies and 70 degree weather. You would have never guessed that just 18 hours before, our state saw the worst weather conditions we have seen in years. CRAZY!
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