The Flood (and The Rat)

On Sunday my friend asked me to help her with an illustration as she was teaching the Sunday school lesson to the kids about the flood and the ark that God had Noah build.  (Here in the city there are churches and a good number of believers, even though we are not far from where unreached people like My People live.) But it was Sunday evening that God gave me my own illustration . . .

I was out and about when the sky got dark, which usually means rain.  But rain hasn’t been coming much at all (it’s been a prayer request for a long time) and my weather app said that if it came at all it wouldn’t last long, so I didn’t hurry home and instead decided to wait until the end of our get-together before I left.  (Remember, I’m on a motorcycle, so driving in the rain isn’t the most fun thing.)  But before the get-together ended, the rain started.  And it rained long and hard with lots of wind.  At one point a door in the shelter we were staying in blew open (think a big, industrial-type door), and though 3 strong men tried to close it, they couldn’t – the wind and rain were too hard that they had to jump out of the way before they were knocked over by it!  A big tree nearby fell, though I was looking the other way and didn’t see the actual fall.  After an hour of torrential downpour, the rain started to slow down a bit, and I figured I’d try to head home before it got dark.  I’d rather drive on flooded roads in the light than the dark!  Those with me had come in cars, and they weren’t able to leave yet because another huge tree fell over the end of the driveway, blocking us in.  However, since I was on a motorcycle, I was able to squiggle my way around it and headed for home.  In the rain and the lightening. 

There were a good number of people out, so I saw that I wasn’t the only one who wanted to head home.  But I didn’t get far before I ran into big puddles – 6 inches deep of water?  I was glad that I knew this road well and there weren’t really big potholes.  As I drove on, the road got more and more flooded, and we were all driving through probably 4 inches of water most of the way.  But then the road up ahead was flowing with gusto, and I knew that quickly-flowing water like that was a lot more dangerous than the more calm water we had been driving through.  So I joined everyone in turning and trying a different route. 

We went for a while, and parts had no standing water at all, while parts had lots of standing water.  But eventually I got to a part where I had to go through rather shallow rapidly flowing water, and I saw how I had to struggle to control the motorcycle.  Then the next road that I had to cross was a whitewater rafting type of river, and I knew that I couldn’t go forward and I couldn’t go back.  So I pulled over and parked my motorcycle up on the sidewalk like many others.

When I got there, the sidewalk was just wet, but no standing water.  But it was rising, and in 10 minutes it had risen 5 inches or so.  Quick math – half an inch a minute.  If it kept that up for a while, we’d be in trouble!  As I was standing in the standing water, though, I felt something tickle under my rain poncho.  (I was wearing one of the $1 clear rain ponchos from the US over my ankle-length dress, the bottom of which was now in the water.)  I looked down, and noticed a tail on my side, under my poncho and outside my dress. I figured it was a lizard coming to find refuge from the rain; I quickly brushed it down, and was horrified to find that it was a rat that had climbed up!  I was glad that the bottom of my dress was in the water so that he never actually touched my skin!

With the water rising like that, and after the rat incident, I realized that I should get to higher ground and not just stand there in the murky water.  So I climbed the steps to the front porch of the bank we were at and joined those already hanging out there.  By this time the rain had mainly stopped, but, as I said, the water was still rising.  We watched the craziness before us – the water rising on the car stuck in the middle of the road (it only ever got to the top of the hood), on the cars parked nearby, and on our motos (and I wondered if I would be able to drive my moto again after that).  Then things started floating by – an empty refrigerator (seen in the picture above), a table, a glass case, someone’s motorcycle (they went in after it, but I’m not sure they were able to save it), etc. 

Boy, was I glad when I noticed that the water was no longer rising, or at least not rising fast.  (I think it rose about 9 inches in that first half hour I was there.)  Then it started to slowly recede, and I thought of Noah and how it took almost a year for the water to recede then!  And as Noah started seeing encouraging signs that showed that his waiting was finishing, so did we.  First I saw the water level go down on the tires of the motorcycles and cars.  Then we saw a few 4-wheel drive cars making it through.  Then I saw the top of the sidewalk and knew that the water was only as powerful as when I first came.  I also knew that it was only a matter of time before I’d be able to go and see if my moto was still running or not. 

Then my friends in the car called and said that they had been able to get out a back way and weren’t far from me.  So I took courage and said I’d try to meet them two blocks away, where there was a hotel where I hoped I could leave my motorcycle for the night.  That drive up-stream for two blocks from the way I had come was not easy, but I made it and was glad to be in a car on my way home.  (My plan B had been to stay at that hotel for the night.) 

We drove through some more rivers and out around to the other side of town.  And miraculously, up that way, the road barely looked wet!  After my hour and a half of being stranded by the rain, it was almost incomprehensible.  (Yes, I’m thinking of Princess Bride right now, too.)  But we made it safely to my door as they dropped me off on their way home.  Boy, was I glad to be home 2 ½ hours after leaving on what is normally a 15-20-minute drive!

And you know what’s funny?  When I got home, and all day, actually, the water was cut at my house – all that water outside, but no running water inside.  Of course.  What would you expect?

And you know what else?  God kept His promise again – though there was a huge flash flood, He cut its life short and He didn’t flood the whole world, just as He promised. 

(Epilogue: The next morning I went back downtown to pick up my motorcycle. It drove just fine, even after its ordeal the day before.  And the roads were all dry.  Even the river was back to normal low levels.  If it weren’t for the debris and sand on the streets, you wouldn’t know that the previous evening people were bailing water out of their shops and cars were stranded on the roads since there were rushing rivers all over!)