I am hopeful

Today while doing my devotion, I sat in the doorway of our apartment. The door faces east, so I sat there pouring out my heart to the Father with the sun streaming warm on me. I was reading about perseverence through the tough times, a perfect devotion for this time in my life. It seems as if our family has had one trial after another since we moved. Nothing has come easy. Nothing. Everything has a hitch. Everything has a delay. Everything has a cost. And each burden has built upon the other.

Last night our area was under a tornado warning. Three times the tornado siren went off when a funnel cloud was sighted. Three times, my son and I went into the bathroom of our apartment, the innermost room, praying the siren would stop. People in our area are on high alert for tornado sirens, as a year ago an F-3 category tornado tore a 14.5 mile destructive path through this city ... and our apartment building lost it's second floor. We were warned of high winds and baseball-sized hail with this storm. The skies blackened darker than any I've ever seen. When living Wisconsin, our family lived across the street from the Outagamie County tornado siren. It went off every Saturday at noon for a test. Aside from those tests, I heard that siren go off in emergency times only twice in six years. Already ours has gone off four times in three weeks we've been here. And it's a terrifying sound. That storm last night made me ponder our experiences and struggles here.

But then today, as I prayed to God for assurance, peace and perseverence while sitting in that doorway, all around me I heard the busy-ness of the world: trucks at Walmart, airplanes overhead, a landscaper weedwacking, cars driving by. Then suddenly, a bird rested in the crepe myrtle tree at the corner of my apartment. And he started to sing ... and sing ... and sing. He sang for 30 minutes straight, hopping to higher and higher branches. Perhaps he was singing for new girlfriend. But I'd like to think he was singing to God. He interrupted my devotion time greater and louder than all the other noises around me. I had to stop and listen. I even got my camera and recorded his song. At one point he stopped and I swear looked at me. So I said, "Go on. Please keep singing." So he started right back up and sang on and on. It was breathtaking.

It was as if, this bird was telling me, "I will keep singing! I will keep praising! Glorify God in the midst of these storms! Persevere!" A bird did this for me. One of the songs in my playlist is a song by John Waller called "While I'm Waiting." His lyrics say: "I'm waiting on you, Lord, and I am hopeful. Though it's painful, patiently I will wait. While I'm waiting, I will worship. While I'm waiting, I will serve you." Like the bird's song, I'm pretty sure Waller wrote it for me.

I am hopeful. While I'm waiting ... I will worship. Perhaps 30 straight minutes of singing and glorifying my God is just the thing ... as "I sing, holy, holy, holy. Holy, holy, holy. Holy, holy, holy, I want to see you."