Like so many, I've been watching the events in Colorado with an unsettling mixture of grief and horror. The fires that are ravaging that state, in particular the Waldo Canyon fire invading the confines of Colorado Springs, are catastrophic and uncomfortably captivating. I tried many times today to focus on my day job, yet found myself looking around for any and all updates I could find.
My folks used to live in the Springs, and I still have family in the state. My extended family has members that have been forced to evacuate, and at least one involved in fighting the fire.
At one point today, I was stricken with the realization that may explain in part why watching homes succumb to the inferno affects me so deeply. I know, in part, exactly what these folks are going through. Yet where the loss of my home came quickly and suddenly, there one moment and smashed beyond recognition the next, these folks are watching this disaster play out in slow motion in front of them, and on TV, each of them wondering when, or if, their homes will be standing upon their return. Surely, many are hoping against hope, praying as fervently as they know how for rain and wind to cooperate and end this unspeakable nightmare. I'm not sure which is a worse way to lose a home. But a loss is a loss, and the shock will last for some time.
Helpless as I am, I pray. Prayer is all I have right now, and encouragement that things can be replaced, a lesson I continue to absorb into my own reality and circumstances. The loss of a home is a terrible thing, but more terrible would be the loss of family, the loss of faith. Retain these latter two, we can all survive and even rejoice.
I wish you all, especially those in danger's path, peace and safety and grace. May the Lord be with you.
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