“Bridge Over Troubled Water”

December 7

Psalm 56:3 “What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee.”

For the last five years we have gone to St. George Island in Florida for a week of beach life during summer vacation.  We rent a house on the beach with the Gulf of Mexico as our front yard.  We have already built wonderful memories of our time on the island and each year brings new adventures.  This past summer was no exception.

This year we flew to Panama City and rented a car to drive the rest of the fifty miles.  Bill was unable to come with us (hopefully that won’t happen again) so I flew with Heather and Lance to help corral the grandkids.  We were running a little later than our normal first day schedule and without Bill’s help the day seemed to exacerbate everyone’s fatigue.  We headed out of Panama City much later than we ever had and still had the longest winding part of the journey ahead of us.  About the time we got to Appalachicola a huge storm arose and the rain began to fall.  What was remarkable about this was we had to cross two huge bridges before we got to St. George Island.  These bridges are both several miles long and very narrow.  We made it across the first one and thought the storm may have lessened when we started the steep drive to the second bridge.  The storm then hit with a vengeance.  Lance was driving, Heather was panicking and I was praying.  Well I was panicking too.  You could not see the road or anything in front of you.  We didn’t know whether to stop or keep moving not knowing if we were to hit the railing.  The wind was blowing the car and the rain was pushing us from side to side.  We couldn’t turn around and knew we had to keep going…we just hoped we would not run into a car that may have stopped in front of us.  Lance kept his calm at least visibly and after what seemed like an eternity, we could see the lights of the island.  About the time we hit land the storm had passed but what a tale we had to tell about our arrival.

As amazing as the storm was though, the grandkids (except for the older ones) were completely oblivious to the danger and were sound asleep despite our nervous chatter.  They completely trusted their dad and felt safe to leave it all up to him.  How much more we should trust our Heavenly Father whenever we pass through life storms!  It may be cliché to say He is with us in the storms of life but He really is.   Sometimes people get confused and think that being a child of God means there won’t be difficulties or troubles.  I know of many instances where very godly people are in very difficult, unwarranted situations.  The difference is not that Christians don’t have difficulties but they have an assurance of the constant presence of God through the Holy Spirit.  Even if circumstances would have turned out differently that night, God would have been no less powerful or loving.  He promised His presence, not the absence of difficulty.

We are thankful we made it safely to our destination that night but I’m sure we will relive that night each time we pass over the bridge from now on.