We Need A Miracle...

               Communities flee,
                   fallen mourned.
                     - Friday, August 21st headline, The Spokesman Review

I was born in Washington state, the "evergreen state" in most
travel manuals. Seattle, on the west side, was my birthplace
and home through college. It's so majestic with Mount Rainier, Lake Washington, and God's grandeur. 

I came to the east side of the state more than forty years ago, when Tim set up his medical practice here. Spokane is my home. The climate is different here. The landscape, just as beautiful. It's more dry here and we usually get more snow. Often... lots of it. But not so this last year. 

We are experiencing a drought of monumental proportions.

While I don't pretend to be an expert on climate issues and what we have done to God's earth in the name of progress, I
can see climate change with my own eyes. Weather patterns that have existed for generations are now disturbed. It makes me so sad as I wonder what the planet will be like for my precious grandchildren.

And now the eastern part of my beloved state is literally up in flames. Wildfires raging on every side. More than thirty of them.

Huge fires. Unstoppable fires. Firefighters taxed to the max. Smoke everywhere, so thick that some planes couldn't land yesterday at the Spokane airport. The air quality was so poor that people were asked to stay inside.

And three selfless, wonderful, young firefighters lost their lives
trying to protect the rest of us.

We are heartbroken.

Small towns like Riverside and Omak have evacuated completely.  The evening news here is full of stories of folks going back to devastation and only rubble where a house once stood. 

We need a miracle.

I was with my grandchildren yesterday and had to talk about an evacuation plan. A horrible what if. My eight year old granddaughter has her puppy's dog food in her backpack. 

Just in case.

I know God is in the middle of this tragedy. We are all praying and I'd ask for your prayers as well. For rain. For the wind to die down. For relief for the firefighters.  For healing in the midst of devastation.

God Bless!
Love Linda