"O God," I prayed, "if I have to die today, please let me have a heart attack" -- a distinct possibility given the adrenalin racing through my system for the past hour -- "but don't let me have to swim with the snakes, ants, spiders, and other creatures who have been displaced by this flood!" I measured the door frame with my eyes, calculating how high the water could rise and still permit my escape with a queen-sized air mattress.
The evening before, I had gone to sleep on that mattress, on loan from a good friend, reading the story of Hagar in the wilderness. When she fled from her mistress Sarah, Hagar thought she was utterly alone and forsaken; she thought she would surely die. But in the wilderness, she encountered the Living God, whom she called The Living One who sees me. Through that encounter, she found direction and courage to return to the house of Abraham until after the birth of her son Ishmael.
When Ishmael was about 12 years old, he and his mother were again thrust into the wilderness because of conflict and constant strife in the household -- a condition that continues to this day between Arabs and Jews. This time, Hagar gave the last of her water to her son and then moved away from him some distance so that she would not have to watch him die. She cried out again to God, and He sent an angel to point out to her a nearby well. On that occasion, she called God The Living One Who hears me.
After studying the story on the night before August 29, I was emboldened to cry out to God the following morning, "You are the One Who sees me and Who hears me! You know where I am! Send help!" Meanwhile, unbeknownst to me, my daughter was watching the disaster from my sister's house in Kentucky. I had been on the phone with her at 10:00, but said, "I have to go now; the water's coming into the house!" And I hung up. Her prayer that morning was, "O God, please send an angel to walk her out of that house!"
Around 1:00 or 2:00 pm (who knew the time?), the storm surge began to recede, carrying with it all the family albums, my children's love notes, birthday cards, and school achievements, along with everything else that could fit through the front door. "Let it go," I said to myself; "let it go." As the winds began to diminish, around 3:30, a man suddenly appeared at my front door. "You cannot stay here tonight," he said, "you have no door." He was right; I had already begun to wonder how I would keep all the wild animals from finding shelter with me during the night. Then he said, "I can walk you out, because I walked in." (Weeks later, I was to hear the prayer of my daughter and marvel at his choice of words.)
Looking at the 12-foot wall of debris in front of my house, left by the wind-ripped houses between me and the beach and the contents of everyone's house that had been deposited by the storm surge; looking at the massive downed trees covered with electrical wires, I myself was terrified to set foot outside of the house. But when he said that he "could walk me out because he had walked in," somehow, I thought I'd be safe with him. Needless to say, he walked me to safety on the other side of the railroad tracks, where immediately we met a school bus being driven by firemen, who were picking up survivors and taking them to a shelter.
There is much more to the story after that, but for now I want to skip to a week later, when I was sitting in the parlor of a pre-civil-war rectory belonging to the Cathedral in Natchez. I was safe, and waiting for the arrival of my husband from New Orleans, who had thought for a week that I had died in Mississippi. As I sat beneath a massive canvas (about 10 feet high), I gazed at the painting of Mary's Assumption into heaven across the room -- and then I became curious as to the subject of the painting behind me. I turned around and with a shock recognized the subject of the painting -- it was a portrayal of the angel in the wilderness, showing Hagar where the well was located. In the foreground was her son lying on the ground, dying of thirst!
Never before nor since have I ever seen a painting of Hagar in the desert; it is simply not a popular subject with artists. But here, after my ordeal, was a 10-foot painting depicting the very prayer I had prayed the week before as I sat on the steps with my heart pounding out of desperation and fear.
This morning, as I flipped the page in my Jesus Calling calendar, I read this entry:
There is no place so desolate that you cannot find Me there. When Hagar fled from her mistress into the wilderness, she thought she was utterly alone and forsaken. But Hagar encountered Me in that desolate place. There she addressed Me as "the Living One Who sees me." Through that encounter with My Presence, she gained courage to return to her mistress.
No set of circumstances could ever isolate you from My loving Presence. Not only do I see you always; I see you as a redeemed saint, gloriously radiant in My righteousness. That is why I take great delight in you and rejoice over you with singing!
Someone gave me this calendar last Christmas; this is the first August I have read the entry for today. Only a Divine Mind could possibly have orchestrated the timing of this entry to remind me of that day nine years ago when I cried out to "the One Who sees me, the One Who hears my cry!" How grateful can I possibly be for all the good God has done for me?
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