Oceans

I was driving this afternoon along the Florida Turnpike, going to the airport after a quick trip to visit family, when a Florida Summer Thunderstorm unleashed upon me and my rental car. There is no thunderstorm like a Florida Thunderstorm. It as if the ocean (in this case, the Atlantic) had swooped up into the sky and dumped down all at once. At best, I could occasionally make out the taillights of the car ahead of me. Much of the time, I settled for catching glimpses of the lane lines between swooshes of the wipers. A few times, I couldn’t see anything at all and simply hoped the highway stayed straight. Getting from the middle lane to the shoulder to wait out the storm was an impossible dream. Thankfully, all of the traffic was forced to a crawl as we all faced the heaven-borne ocean. 

I had been fiddling with the radio knob on my rental car right before I drove into the storm. Having driven out of the range of the classical station I had been enjoying the past couple of days, I had been trying in vain to find something else agreeable. I was in the lower part of the radio, the home of NPR and multiple Christian music stations. (Confession time- I rarely listen to Christian music on the radio. Sometimes the theology makes my skin crawl, but mostly the style of music doesn’t suit my taste. I’ll be the first to say that I don’t have the best musical taste around, but I can only listen to soaring strings for short bursts.) The onslaught of the storm had stopped my search, and my radio was playing, unnoticed, on whatever it had landed on last. 

After about fifteen minutes of white-knuckled driving while the oceanic storm continued unabated, I was growing weary. And then I heard a few familiar chords out of the corner of my ear. What was that song? I paid attention to the radio for the first time since the storm began. “You call me out upon the waters.” I smiled as the words continued. “And I will call upon Your name, And keep my eyes above the waves, When oceans rise, my soul will rest in Your embrace, For I am Yours and You are mine.” I started to sing along, white knuckles and blinding rain and all.

“Your grace abounds in deepest waters
Your sovereign hand
Will be my guide
Where feet may fail and fear surrounds me
You've never failed and You won't start now.”

So I will call upon Your name
And keep my eyes above the waves
When oceans rise, my soul will rest in Your embrace
For I am Yours and You are mine.”

By the time the song ended, the rain had, also. And I just kept smiling, thankful once again for another gift of God, just the right thing at just the right time. As always.

(By the way, the name of the song is Oceans, and it’s by Hillsong United.)