Strength for the Moment

Alright, so on Saturday the 13'th, I woke up exhausted. Not an exciting start to my story, I know, but its true. I was tired and I had hurt my foot the day before. Yeah, that's not exciting either, but it made it so I couldn't wear the shoes I wanted to, which had heals. That may not sound important, but remember that, its more relevant then you would think.

So, my family went and volunteered at our local food pantry, like we do every Saturday. It was kind of frustrating, because it took us much longer to clean up then it usually does, so instead of getting out at 11:00 like we were supposed to, we got out at 11:30 and we had to stop by the store as well, making us get home even later.

I was very happy when we finally started driving up the road leading to our driveway. But off to our left there is a large field, and a hill with a house on top and we saw smoke coming from the direction of the house. We were in a burn ban, but we thought maybe our neighbors were burning illegally.

Now we live the country, you can only see the house from a couple spots, so it would have been easy to get away with burning without being caught. We were originally just going to go home and call the Sheriff, but there was enough smoke we decided to check it out.

We drove up and saw that nearly half and acre of land was on fire, clearly not contained. So my mom went and got the attention of the people in the house, and the rest of us went down and started dumping sand on the fire as quickly as we could.

My sister called the fire department, and my brother and some friends came over from our house to help. It quickly became evident that it was spreading much faster then we could fight it.

The charred grass.

But it was going towards the house, so we all focused our efforts there. The owner showed us where the spickets were, so we could finally get water, and wet down blankets to put on the flame.

By God's grace He let us get the fire so it was no longer burning towards the house, but then it was getting close to a row of hay bales.

Just in case you don't know, when a hay bale catches on fire, it is bad. The fire spreads in seconds, and is very bad.

This almost seemed to be a mocking part of the fire. It was burnt so badly you couldn't turn it off, and it was pouring out water, but we couldn't really use it because it was away from the flames. It was ironic to see so much water pouring out when we needed it in another place. But I know God had a reason for that.

While we were fighting the fire there, it had been nearly thirty minutes since we got there. It may not sound like long, but when you are running around it is a long time. I was filling buckets for them to take the flame and I thought I was going to drop down.

I had read so many books where people are stretched to their limits, and they pray and they suddenly have no pain and have tons of strength. While that might happen, I think God normally chooses to work in a way that keeps us coming back to him. I prayed, over and over, and I still felt like I was going to drop. My prayers quickly became "God please just let me do this one bucket" and "God please just help me to carry this over where it needs to go."
And he always gave me just enough strength to do it, reminding me much of this passage:


2 Corinthians 12: 8-9

Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me

The Firemen got there just in time to save the whole line of trees from catching on fire.

Thirty minutes after we arrived the fire department came. Sirens have never sounded so beautiful in my whole life. 

We all had to get out of the way so that the three volunteer fire departments could do their job, so I got some photos. Then things started hitting me even more clearly. 

The fire did not burn the house, the hay bales, a row of storage sheds, or the line of trees. 

No one was hurt while fighting the flames. 

We all were given strength to persevere through the whole fire. 

Three all volunteer fire departments from three different counties came to help. 

God is amazing. 

Their dog, walking though the charred ground.

And guys, if I hadn't hurt my foot, I would have been in heels. If I had been in heels, I couldn't have fought the fire because you cannot run over sanding territories with heals. 

If we hadn't taken longer at the food pantry, there wouldn't have been enough smoke for us to notice and we would have gone home and that whole place might have burned down. 

If God hadn't given us grace for the moment, we would not have been able to push through until the fire department got there. 

A small blessing at the end of the fight when we found this dragonfly sitting on the ground.

God worked everything out so perfectly and I am so incredibly blessed to be able to be His child. 

And this is the verse took on a whole new meaning because none of us got any burns.
I was wearing sandals and walking through still burning embers, and it didn't burn me, or the shoes.

Isaiah 43:2

When you walk through the fire,you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.

Never underestimate the grace and strength God will give you in the moment.