Wildfire - Beauty Out of Ashes

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Just about six hours after the fire started two miles away from our house.

The fire continued to grow through the night

Hello again. It has been a while, but I’m back in Vancouver again, staying at David’s house. However, getting here has been quit the challenge. I worked hard for six week fixing our home, taking stuff to the dump, getting Roberta settled in and helping others. Then went over some final things that my wife would need to know and do while I was gone. Earlier that week, I had told her that I would also be staying a day longer than I had originally planned and it turned out to be a really good thing, but not for the reasons that I had expected. During this time I also lost fifteen pound from all the hard work I did even though I ate and drank a lot of food and water.

However, the day before I was to leave, a wildfire started about two miles from our house and it was very windy. I prayed for the winds to calm down, keep the fire away from our home and for the protection of the firefighters and for God to give them wisdom on how to fight it. But the fire, wind and hot weather and dry conditions proved to be far more than they could handle. Later that evening we could see a red glow in the sky from our windows, so we took a drive just to see how bad it really was. What we saw was heart breaking. The hills were on fire for miles and smoke covered the whole valley and made it hard to breath so we turn around and went back home to get our cameras again and then drove the other directions to where the fire had originally started and took some more pictures. It was now after midnight, so we went back home and tried to get some sleep before my last day.

Our power to the house had gone out temporally, during the night, and at five in the morning we got a knock on our door. It turn out to be an evacuation notice for our area. However, because of God’s promises, I knew we would be safe, but Roberta still wanted to be prepared any way, just in case. She suggested I load the van with the things I would be taking on my trip and she would load her car with what she thought was important, plus had me get the cat carrier. After that I went a took a visual of the situation and again later behind our property, but saw nothing threatening and went back to work on a few more things around the house.

Our daughter called later and informed us that the fire had jumped the river in two places that separated us from the fire. By afternoon helicopters came and started taking water from the small lake in our backyard, so I went and took another visual and saw black smoke coming from neighbors houses on fire about a mile away, but they were all still downwind from us. I felt sorry for those people, but knew God was changing their lives that day, just as He always does in these kinds of situations, and hopefully someday they might see the good in it all. These disasters should help us to learn and focus on what's really more important—Jesus. But for now, it would still be a painful experience for them. I pray they will find true comfort and peace in God's shelter and the help from friends and neighbors.

I did a few more things for Roberta inside the house, and then it came time for me to leave. It had been a stressful day, and now we needed to say our goodbye. It was just a little after six and I still had a four hour drive to Sheldon's house, where I had a 9 AM appointment the next day for an auto detailing on my van, that my wife had made two month earlier. We embrace and then we prayed for each other. I told her that I loved her, always have and always will. And she said she loved me too.

I believe, this was not the way either of us wanted or expected for our last day together to end, but that’s the way some things happen. As I drove away I was numb and speechless from it all. I had just left my wife not knowing when I would see her again, and the valley I once called home. Now it was on fire and covered with a thick dark smoke and ashes as far as the eye could see. And yet I know it was all a prophecy, and someday they would eventually know and see God’s loving care in it all. God has awesome plans for the people in this valley and county, because of the seeds I have sown there. I have walked the length and breathe of that county and interceded, fasted and prophesied over it many times. And God is faithful and He answer our prayers. In time they will see the true love and power of the heavenly Father. Beauty will come forth from these ashes and it will be better than it ever was before, because that’s how Abba Father works.

P.S. The fire has already destroyed over 80 house and over 50 barns (ten of the houses were near our house) and over 30,000 acres were burned in just three days and it was only 33% contained.

A note of special thanks: I am very grateful for all the help my loving wife did in preparing me for this journey. It would have been very difficult for me if I had not had her support, thoughtfulness and prayers.