In the Eye of the Storm

If you pay attention to weather like I do, you’ve probably noticed that we’ve had an extremely active hurricane season in the Atlantic this year.  Every year the National Hurricane Center (NHC) puts out a list of 21 names for the Atlantic basin; they skip Q, U, X, Y, and Z. (There are similar lists for other areas; you can easily look them up if you’re interested.)  Since 1953, female names have been used for hurricanes.  In 1979, the NHC began using an alternating list of male and female names.  Most years, 21 names are more than sufficient in the Atlantic.  

But 2020!  I’d think we’d all agree that this year has been anything but normal.  So, why not add a hyperactive hurricane season?!  On September 18, we exhausted the list of 2020 Atlantic hurricane names when Tropical Storm Wilfred formed—over two months before Hurricane Season ends.  The National Hurricane Center does have a contingency plan for when we have more than 21 storms in a season; we move to the Greek Alphabet for names.  We’re  now up to Tropical Storm Beta—and it’s only September 23!  We may well break the record set in 2005 (the only other year we’ve had to “Go Greek” in modern history) before all is said and done. (You may remember 2005 was a rough year; it featured Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and Wilma, all of which significantly impacted the U.S.; we got as far as Zeta, the sixth Greek letter, that year.)

All these storms spinning in the Atlantic this year got me to thinking of all the things swirling in my life right now and how, like a hurricane’s storm surge, they can “sweep me out to sea” if I’m not careful.   

This led me to start sketching a picture in my journal which I’ve shown here. I am not a great artist so perhaps a little interpretation helps.  The sketch is based on the symbol meteorologists use to represent hurricanes, with bands radiating from the center of the storm.  On each of the bands,  I listed some cloud of concern for me right now.  You can see my job (GST/NASA), my wife, my children, and also broader societal concerns like the election, climate change, and of course COVID-19.  You can also see some of my ministry pursuits like writing, being a Certified Lay Servant, and my interest in possibly becoming an Earthkeeper.  In the center of it all I put Jesus and me. 

As often happens when I pray or journal, songs will come to mind.  One of my favorite songs is called, “Be the Centre,” by Michael Frye  The simple lyrics ask Jesus to be our source, our light, our hope, our song, our vision, our path, our guide, the wind in our sails, and the fire in our heart.  But what I most like is the image of me being safe in the center with Jesus 

I don’t just want Jesus to just be another thing swirling in the storms of my life, I want Jesus to be the calm center of my life.  

To say it another way, I want Jesus to be “In the Eye of the Storm” with me (which is another song, by Ryan Stevenson, that came to me during my prayer time).  Those who fly into the most intense hurricanes report that they often encounter the fiercest winds and rain in the eyewall, but then, abruptly the skies clear as they enter the eye, and they experience an eerie peace—a calm center—a temporary reprieve from the maelstrom swirling around them.  

Later in the week, I came across a quote in a post from a Richard Rohr devotional that resonated with this idea of finding God in the center of all things—even in the midst of circumstances we’d never willingly choose ourselves.  Rohr quotes a young Jewish woman who he says, “suffered much more injustice in the concentration camp than we are suffering now.”  She wrote these words while she was imprisoned: 

There is a really deep well inside me. And in it dwells God. Sometimes I am there, too … And that is all we can manage these days and also all that really matters: that we safeguard that little piece of You, God, in ourselves.

—Etty Hillesum, Westerbork transit camp

Rohr goes on to say that, “Somehow our occupation and vocation as believers in [the current sad time must be to first restore the Divine Center by holding it and fully occupying it ourselves.  If contemplation means anything, it means that we can “safeguard that little piece of You, God,” as Hillesum describes it. What other power do we have now? All else is tearing us apart, inside and out, no matter who wins the election or who is on the Supreme Court. We cannot abide in such a place for any length of time or it will become our prison.”

I think what Rohr says here is simple yet profound. If we can firmly anchor ourselves in the eye of the storm with Jesus, he will teach us to recognize and “safeguard that little piece of You, God,” in ourselves.  When we begin to see the Divine Image more clearly in ourselves, it becomes easier to extend that benevolent vision to every other person and creature on this planet.  As we do that,  we learn what Dallas Willard meant when he said: “This world is a perfectly safe place to be”—and that this is true no matter how many hurricanes come our way. 

FOR REFLECTION

·      I showed a sketch of Hurricane Me.  What does Hurricane You look like?  What or who are your clouds of concern at the moment?  Maybe you would want to take time to draw Hurricane You and see what comes to mind?  It was a helpful exercise for me. 

·      What’s your eyewall?  What are the fiercest storm(s) you face right now? Do you feel that God is with you in the eyewall guiding you toward the eye?

·      Where is your eye—your calm center?  Where do you go to connect with God?  Is it a physical place, a state of mind—or both?  

·      If you don’t have an eye or can’t see it now, what can you do to establish or find your eye?