struck

In the storms of life we are often given brief flashes of eternity, glimpses of glory, electrically charged snapshots of God. I cannot really explain how this happens. It is as if God cracks open heaven ever so briefly, just enough to let the current down around us to arouse the deep longing in our soul for Something not of this earth-- the Thing we are truly made for-- connection with Him.

Inside each baptised Christian runs a positive spiritual current so deep at the primal level that we, in our “dressed up” twenty-first century lives, have almost managed to smother it with our layers and layers of sophistication, like thermal insulators. But the bare-naked, raw charge and longing that our ancestors knew is still very much there. We must, in some way, connect to Him or we will spend a life pusillanimously smoldering, never knowing true satisfaction or the electric charged, full-throttled life that only God can give.

We go to church, we half heartedly sing our songs and say our prayers, not knowing that the FLASH, the SPARK, the potential for a STRIKE that we so desperately long for is housed INSIDE each one of us. The Thing, or better yet, the SOMEONE we desire to connect to lives deep within.

Believe it or not, the brightest visible streaks of lightning go from the ground upwards because the initial path for the current to flow upon has already been established from above.

“Cloud-to-ground lightning comes from the sky down, but the part you see comes from the ground up. A typical cloud-to-ground flash lowers a path of negative electricity (that we cannot see) towards the ground in a series of spurts. Objects on the ground generally have a positive charge. Since opposites attract, an upward streamer is sent out from the object about to be struck. When these two paths meet, a return stroke zips back up to the sky. It is the return stroke that produces the visible flash, but it all happens so fast - in about one-millionth of a second - so the human eye doesn't see the actual formation of the stroke.”*

So the downward strike creates an ionized path. The brightness of this strike is less because the current is less as it travels through un-ionized air. The upward strike now takes the newly formed ionized path. Therefore the upward strike's current (brightness) is much greater as the electrons flow along this freshly made bridge--the ionized path-- the path of least resistance. The current equals the voltage divided by the resistance. The less the resistance, the higher the current.

The Blessed Trinity is inside each baptised Christian. The storms of life create opportunities for new ionized paths to be created. If we are open to them, and do not resist what God is trying to do in and through them, often times the most powerful and beautiful connections with God can happen at these moments.

Awesome!

“From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings, and peals of thunder... Day and night they do not stop exclaiming:

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God almighty, who was, and who is, and who is to come.’

Whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to the one who sits on the throne, who lives forever and ever...They throw down their crowns before the throne, exclaiming:

‘Worthy are you, Lord our God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things; because of your will they came to be and were created.’” Revelation 4:5,8,10,11

Dear Lord,

I am struck and often left baffled by Your Majesty and ability to turn the darkness and storminess of my life into powerful opportunities for connection with You. May I not be afraid to be open and allow Your power to connect with me. Through this connection something beyond all telling will occur. Only by Your grace does this happen. You are always the instigator of activity in my life and I am simply a responder, following a path You have already created for me to follow. Lord, move, work, flow freely in me and through me in a powerful and loving way, to do Your will. Let it be so obvious that all those around me give You praise and glory.

I ask this in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

*Source: National Severe Storms Laboratory