Make sure your anchor holds

Erick Kalenga
Published: September 6, 2008

Almost every morning before I leave my house, I turn on the television set to watch the news and the weather forecast. A few weeks ago Florida was hit by Tropical Storm Fay.

Matt Sedensky, Associated Press writer, said: “Tropical Storm Fay rolled ashore in southwestern Florida on Tuesday without much fanfare, but stubbornly hung around like an unwelcome house guest, gaining power and threatening — once again — to become a hurricane.

“The storm first hit the Florida Keys, veered out to sea and then traversed east across the state on a path that would curve it toward the Florida-Georgia border. The failure of Fay to weaken meant a whole new swath of the state had to prepare for a worse storm, and meant Florida could wind up getting hit three separate times. This storm is going to be with us for a while. That’s obvious now. It looks like it could be a boomerang storm.”

Gov. Charlie Crist said at a news conference earlier in the day that it appeared that Fay would simply peter out and perhaps bring nothing but heavy rains to the southeastern United States. But by late Tuesday, a hurricane watch was posted for parts of north Florida and Georgia as Fay seemed to be resurrected by the flat, swampy
Everglades, in-creasing the chances it could still end up strengthening into a hurricane.

Tropical Storm Fay created a great deal of destruction and was the cause of a number of deaths.

I will be very honest, I have never been affected by this kind of extreme weather. But I visited in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. It was a heart-breaking situation.
 
By looking at the boomerang effect of Tropical Storm Fay, I could not help but draw a parallel to my life this summer.

I was very challenged with a number of things. It certainly felt like I was going through a storm and this storm had turned into a tornado and made multiple touchdowns. It was literally one thing after another.

During this time I was reminded of a passage of scripture in Mark 4:35-40 wherein Christ was in a boat with His disciples and they faced a storm.

The majority of these men were professional fishermen. They knew how to deal with extreme weather.

But this particular storm was different. I would not speculate why, because there are a number of people who will interpret it differently, but what I learned from these verses was that Christ was able to sleep due to the fact He had peace and trust that everything is subject to Him. This was a source of strength for me — knowing that it does not matter what I am going through as long as I have peace and trust in Christ, and believing that He has the power to calm any storm in my life.

There is a part of a Ray Boltz song that says: “The anchor holds. Though the ship is battered, the anchor holds. Though the sails are torn, I have fallen on my knees, as I
faced the raging sea, the anchor holds, in spite of the storm.”

As long as I trust in my anchor, it does not matter how bad the storm is, He will hold things together and calm things down. There are many ways to deal with the issues and challenges of life, and most of our young people don’t know how to deal with the storms of life.

Storms will always pass; don’t lose your faith, even if you feel like I felt this summer, like someone who is drowning. Keep the faith.

In some instances you may lose everything or even loved ones, but just trust in your anchor. He will hold you.

Please pray for me, as I pray for you.

Erick Kalenga is an independent columnist who appears Sundays in the Star-Exponent. He is a high school soccer coach and works with teens in a youth group setting. E-mail