F-L-O-O-D!

So this morning, John started to stir in his sleep just before 6am. That woke James up and the moment he put his feet on the floor he alerted me to get up immediately. Not completely aware of what was going on, I got up. And when I put my feet on the ground, I got a rude shock. There was water EVERYWHERE. It took me a while to come to terms with what was going on. Thank God John resettled so we quickly got started on damage control.

I think assessing the damage was the scariest part for me. This was what happened... our balcony on the third level had flooded due to a drainage hole clogged with leaves. The water had flooded into our room and flowed out and down the stairs and flooded the second level. It then flowed down and pooled on the ground floor, affecting everything in its path - from a TV to all our rugs to paper note books (just to mention a few). On the ground floor, John's play area was affected and so were his shoes, which we keep on one of the shelves.

All family members were alerted and we all began using towels to collect all the water into pails. By mid-morning, we had cleared out all the water. John did wake up about 45 min after we started cleaning and he happily played in his room (one of the two rooms not affected at all - thank God) till it was time to go down for breakfast.

The one thing I really appreciate about our family (I stay with my in-laws) is that when something like this happens, we assess the problem and we find a solution and act immediately. There's no blaming, no quarelling, no irritation... just a common goal to fix the damage. And that was what helped us get through the crisis quickly. In fact after everything happened, we sat down and laughed about it. I think that is really precious and something I cannot take for granted.

Having reflected on this the whole day, I have learnt so much from this one event. God is constantly teaching us more about Himself and if we take time to ponder and wait on Him, we can learn a lot!

One very huge lesson I learnt was that our God orchestrates and provides protection for His children. Despite the flood, not a single essential electrical appliance was affected. Not a single one of the 5 laptops in the house was on the floor. Not a single one of the handphones was on the floor (I usually charge my HP on the floor, but last night, I decided to charge it on top of a pile of old clothes). Yes, one TV was drenched, but we hardly use it at all. God obviously knew the heavy rain was going to come, and He protected what was important to us.

Also, I was supposed to have a vocal session with the choir at my place this morning, but on Monday, I decided to change the time and scheduled it after lunch. Should I have stuck to the initial time of 10am, I would have had to cancel the session - and I'm sure God didn't want that. So I still managed to have the session and it was a wonderful time of worshiping and sharing.

This is just one lesson I learnt. I will blog more about this in the next few days. But I just want to say this again: God is good... REALLY. And I stand in awe of Him today, knowing that though the thunders roar and the floods come up, God is still in control and He is there orchestrating and strategising so we can come out of crises victorious and stronger in our faith in Jesus Christ. Praise God!