Taking Shelter

We’re in the basement.

Just as we were heading off for Good Friday services at church, all our phones went crazy and the town sirens fired up.

This is not a test. Take shelter.

Now we’re in the basement waiting for it to pass. Service has been postponed.

Shelter…

Shelter in place…

Take shelter…

You do not debate a warning like that. You grab your kids and animals and move downstairs, even though outside it doesn’t seem like the wind is blowing at all.

Shelter.

The Hebrew word (one of them, at least) is machseh.

It’s not a casual word. Not a metaphor you use when life is easy.

It means refuge. The place you run when something is actually coming for you.

Scripture says God is that.

Not an idea. Not an inspiration.

A place.

There is another word. Seter.

The hidden place.

Not just protected, but covered and held somewhere the storm cannot reach.

And underneath both of those is an image that shows up again and again.

Rock.

Something that does not move when everything else does.

Tonight, the town told us to take shelter, and we did.

We did not argue. We did not hesitate. We didn’t try to stand out in it and prove something.

We went down and took cover.

Good Friday says the same thing.

Not about weather.

About judgment. About sin. About death. About everything we cannot outrun, or outthink, or outwork.

Take shelter.

And then it tells us where.

Not in our strength.

Not in our goodness.

Not in our control, but in a special place.

In Christ.

The cross is not just where forgiveness happens.

It is where we go.

It is our machseh.

Our refuge.

Our shelter.

Tonight, the sirens told us to take shelter.

Good Friday tells us where it is found.