And when I used to teach Sunday School, I knew the anxiety that big shakers induced in young children. Their world was not as secure as they had thought. So, I would sing an old song that I learned during the "Jesus People Movement" taken from Psalm 46:
"God is our refuge and strength;God is our reguge and strength;
A very present help in trouble.
God is our refuge and strength.
Therefore, I will not fear
though the earth should move
though the mountains fall in to the heart of the sea...
God is our refuge and strength."
On Thursday night, I could not turn off the TV and go to bed. I was transfixed by the live images from helicopters following the leading edge of a giant wave sweeping a mounting slurry of destructive debris across the Northern Japanese coast. Boats, cars and houses were all being picked up like plastic toys and tossed forward into houses, bridges and trees. I felt helpless in the face of such incredible power.
Besides the empathy I felt for those who were suffering, I also felt a kind of resignation. Yes, God sometimes allows a smidgen of His power to be revealed to us in order to remind us where to put our trust.
In the Christian sci-fi classic, Perelandra, C. S. Lewis shows the "Adam and Eve" of Perelandra (Venus) living on floating islands made of the roots of trees. The prohibition was not "don't eat the fruit" but "don't stay overnight on solid ground." In other words, the temptation for the Perelandrans was to place their trust in what they could build, store and own themselves, rather than accepting the tentative nature of their floating islands. They had to trust that God would provide what they needed, when they needed it, moment by moment.
When disaster strikes us, it should be a reminder that our refuge is God Himself. Our trust is never really in the transitory "stuff" of life--our possessions. Instead, God Himself is our refuge and strength.
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