Here we are in the time of year when snow, ice, heavy cold rain and other such weather events are getting heavy play in the media. Every year they tell us this is the worst storm, a record breaker, as they try to reuse the old story line in place of something new. Let's face it, folks. Bad weather is a normal fact of life and we all need to prepare for it according to where we live and the climate and the lay of the land that living there entails.
Yesterday, even down here in North Florida, some of the area received ice and snow and even the threat of it closed some schools. Even one of our major interstate arteries was closed by ice for a significant period of time. And even that weather shouldn't be all that surprising since low temperatures in the twenties and even the teens are not unheard of around here. Of course, freezing orange trees as pictured here are not the big problem they used to be since Hurricane Irma back in September largely decimated the crop.
And while we worry about what the Weather Channel tells us, mankind just seems to think that no matter what the weather, we can conquer it in whatever we do. We build summer homes and resorts on shifting sands by the ocean and seem surprised when they flood or are seriously damaged, sometimes totally destroyed. We develop huge communities in swampy areas and they flood, usually damaging other neighborhoods which become the victim of the additional water runoff that wasn't properly planned for. Large bridges are built over vast bodies of water with swift currents and changing tides and we are shocked when they fail, creating more inconvenience for those counting on them than they had in the first place. And, as we've seen recently in California, building and rebuilding in massive fire prone areas offers repeated targets for deadly brush fires.
And what about the developers and the politicians who put these things in motion to begin with, promising the stars without even seeing the moon first? Well, they move on or retire, enriched and smiling as they leave the problems created to those left behind. And the cost to make things right again? It's off the charts and the end result is, of course, never as good as the way things were.
So what is the cure to all of the great plans that so often fall awry? First, look carefully at nature. When you witness a violent thunderstorm, a tornado, a hurricane, or maybe a winter blizzard, ponder the power and the sheer unbridled energy that nature brought to bear. And consider the locale and the limitations of its environment before going forward. Look at it with your eyes open wide, not with them glazed over by the money that can be generated. Look at it from a what-if point of view.
There is nothing that man can do to prepare for all contingencies because man doesn't know what all of them are. Nature is, after all, a force of God, that all knowing Supreme Being who created us to live in His image. And that means we are to use our granted dominion over all things on the earth in a godly way. If we would do that, we could preclude much of the heartache and suffering that we create today by developing the earth in consonance with nature, not in spite of it.
God wants us to enjoy the earth that He created for us, but we all must remember that in the sense of His Big Picture, we own nothing. We are His as is the land, so it's important for us to use it wisely. After all, when all is said and done we can't take it with us. Maybe, just maybe, some of the very storms that we claim are so inconvenient yet happen routinely might be happening to remind us of that very thing. Something worth remembering, don't you think?
Yesterday, even down here in North Florida, some of the area received ice and snow and even the threat of it closed some schools. Even one of our major interstate arteries was closed by ice for a significant period of time. And even that weather shouldn't be all that surprising since low temperatures in the twenties and even the teens are not unheard of around here. Of course, freezing orange trees as pictured here are not the big problem they used to be since Hurricane Irma back in September largely decimated the crop.
And while we worry about what the Weather Channel tells us, mankind just seems to think that no matter what the weather, we can conquer it in whatever we do. We build summer homes and resorts on shifting sands by the ocean and seem surprised when they flood or are seriously damaged, sometimes totally destroyed. We develop huge communities in swampy areas and they flood, usually damaging other neighborhoods which become the victim of the additional water runoff that wasn't properly planned for. Large bridges are built over vast bodies of water with swift currents and changing tides and we are shocked when they fail, creating more inconvenience for those counting on them than they had in the first place. And, as we've seen recently in California, building and rebuilding in massive fire prone areas offers repeated targets for deadly brush fires.
And what about the developers and the politicians who put these things in motion to begin with, promising the stars without even seeing the moon first? Well, they move on or retire, enriched and smiling as they leave the problems created to those left behind. And the cost to make things right again? It's off the charts and the end result is, of course, never as good as the way things were.
So what is the cure to all of the great plans that so often fall awry? First, look carefully at nature. When you witness a violent thunderstorm, a tornado, a hurricane, or maybe a winter blizzard, ponder the power and the sheer unbridled energy that nature brought to bear. And consider the locale and the limitations of its environment before going forward. Look at it with your eyes open wide, not with them glazed over by the money that can be generated. Look at it from a what-if point of view.
There is nothing that man can do to prepare for all contingencies because man doesn't know what all of them are. Nature is, after all, a force of God, that all knowing Supreme Being who created us to live in His image. And that means we are to use our granted dominion over all things on the earth in a godly way. If we would do that, we could preclude much of the heartache and suffering that we create today by developing the earth in consonance with nature, not in spite of it.
God wants us to enjoy the earth that He created for us, but we all must remember that in the sense of His Big Picture, we own nothing. We are His as is the land, so it's important for us to use it wisely. After all, when all is said and done we can't take it with us. Maybe, just maybe, some of the very storms that we claim are so inconvenient yet happen routinely might be happening to remind us of that very thing. Something worth remembering, don't you think?
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