The Tornado
I just wanted to send all of you a little note about an
experience that happened to my family last night.
We had just finished supper and were getting ready to drive
up to Cedarville College, which is a Christian College 45
minutes north east of where we live. Spring Valley Academy,
where Tom teaches, was taking a group of students up there
to a Christian Concert (Caedmon's Call!!)
On Friday night and we were going to pick up the tickets
for his students. As we were getting ready to leave, David,
being the "charming" 3-year-old that he is, kept saying, "I
don't want to go", "I want to stay home", and wouldn't put
on his shoes, use the potty or anything. It was getting
later and later and Tom and I were getting just a little
impatient, but trying to encourage him to "hurry up".
Finally, things were in line and we were all buckled into
our mini-van headed for Cedarville College. As we were
leaving we noticed on the
T.V. that there was a thunderstorm watch, but didn't think
anything of it, as those are quite common in Ohio. Also, it
had started raining quite hard outside, but again we just
figured it all would pass shortly.
As we pulled onto I-675 north, the rain seemed to let up and
things were looking pretty good for travel. About 15 minutes
into our trip David fell asleep, he usually is cranky when
he's tired, so we were glad he was getting the rest he
needed, as well as giving us a little time to ourselves.
After pulling onto Route 35 and heading east, the sky
started turning dark again and it started raining again. We
were driving along, heading into a little town called Xenia,
enjoying listening to our own music and having adult
conversation (since David was asleep :-)) when we saw a cop
car come up behind us. We were speeding a little, and at
first we were worried, but he went flying by, so we figured
he was chasing "somebody else".
Less than a half mile down the road we noticed there were a few cars stopped in the road, so we slowed down and noticed there was a tree in the road. "That won't stop us" we thought, "we'll just cut through this little plaza over here and be back on Route 35 in no time". That's exactly what we did, but we were not prepared for what we saw in that plaza. First of all, it was very dark in the plaza. Well it was dark outside, but we wondered why there were no lights on. Then we saw it, it kind of hit us all at once.
There were no roofs on any of the stores in the plaza.
When I say stores, I mean large stores like Wal-Mart,
Kroger, Fashion Bug, etc., etc. Branches were all over the
parking lot, as well as whole trees that were uprooted. In
addition, sections of the plaza as well as a tire store and
several other smaller buildings were completely
unrecognizable, they were smashed and destroyed so totally.
People were everywhere looking for their cars, trying to get
help. About that time emergency vehicles started arriving
and we knew that help was on the way. We called a friend of
ours to see what they were saying on the weather and all the
news was saying, at that point, was that there were severe
thunderstorms with some possible rotation in the clouds. We
knew better than that.
All I can say is, God can use little children to accomplish
His perfect timing and I know that he spared us from this
tornado. It has taught me a bit more patience with my little
one, that's for sure. What an awe-inspiring thought that God
can use even the tiniest of us to make a difference.
FYI: Today, they are still assessing the damage and as it
has only been light for an hour or so, I am sure they will
continue to find more. As of 6:30 this morning they were not
even officially admitting that it was a tornado (although a
large number of people saw funnel clouds touching down --
how can that be??) assessing it at level 3/4 with 5 being
the worst. Please pray for the victims of this terrible
storm. But I am praising God that he had his hand over our
family last night -- that 10 minutes later made all the
difference!!
(Send on Thu, 21 Sep 2000 )