You never think that something like this would happen in the place that you call home.
Today around 1pm, there was a violent gas explosion on the street that runs parallel to mine, obliterating one home, completely destroying ten houses and damaging many others, injuring seven workers, and killing one person. From where my house sits, this site (that looks much like a mini Ground Zero) is visible from my window, directly behind the houses that are across the street from me.
The explosion only caused (very) minor damage to my house and it felt rather odd to be welcomed home by numerous news station vans at the end of my driveway.
But as the hours have ticked on today, the eeriness of it moved from surreal to sickening. The devastation of it all hit me little by little. My body felt tense as I turned on the television and watched an interview of a childhood friend who lives across the street from me explain what the explosion felt like and then another childhood friend telling about the injuries he received as the explosion knocked him over. The weirdest interview I watched was of my next-door neighbor because my house was in the background of the camera shot. I froze in horror as I watched a dog find the dead body in the rubble on live television and my heart sank even more when later in the night I stood up and looked out my window and saw the lights and the huge crane illuminating the darkness of the night.
I'm not sure why I feel so shaken up, especially because my life and my loved ones lives weren't effected. But as I watched clip after clip of families running through the grass onto my street, as I watched these people trace the same pathway I would take as a high schooler walking home from my friends' houses, my stomach knotted up inside.
It looks like a war zone over here in Mountain View. There are emergency vehicles and news casters everywhere. The firehouse is full of people without homes for the night and my heart breaks every time I look at images of the aftermath.
In all of this uncertainty ("I can't believe this happened here" and "Could this same gas explosion happen tomorrow in my house?") I am certain of one thing: The love of God is so thick and real and immense. And this Love pierces through any pain and darkness and fright.
Jesus is present in the midst of the suffering. He is with the families grieving and the families without homes. He is with the frightened and the workers who were injured and their friends and families.
He is right there in the rubble.
Right there in the middle of it.
He isn't a far off God who will try to fix this. He isn't a God that doesn't notice and doesn't care. He is present and He is there with the brokenhearted and the afraid. He is present in the debris.
It seemed appropriate to me that most of the damage in my house was nail damage to the framework and ceilings (other than a poor decapitated wooden duck that fell off of a wall somewhere) when the damage done to my Savior was also nail damage. And when I look up at the holes that now dot my ceiling from where these nails were shaken by the brute force, I am reminded of the holes from the nails that pierced His hands and feet.
He is here, I know it. Despite the eeriness of the news chopper breaking through the silence of the night, He is here. In my neighborhood, in the firehouse, with the brokenhearted, in the rubble, He is here.
He is God.
He is Love.
And He is making all things new.
I am confident that this God of death and resurrection will bring Life to this rubble. He will bring Life to this tragedy and resurrect it for His purposes because He cares and loves and pursues and restores. He will create beauty from the mess. I know this because it's His nature. I know this because I know Him.
He doesn't just pick up the broken pieces, but He sits in them as the crane sifts through the rubble. He is present in the middle of the heartache. The explosion was strong, but His love is stronger still. The damage is immense, but His love is greater. The road to healing and recovery and restoration is long, but He walks it with us.
[Listen over the helicopter. Do you hear Him? He is here.]
The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. [Psalm 34:18]
If someone is reading this that was personally effected, know that I am so sorry and my heart breaks for you and I am praying for you. But also know that there is a God who loves you and is there with you and desires for you to know Him. Also, my church would love to help you in any way possible so feel free to visit ccmercer.com or email connecting@ccmercer.com
