All day the wind had been blowing in fitful little puffs and gusts. Clouds were flying across the sky, and there were frequent showers warm, tropical showers.
In the little farming and fishing village of Moore Haven, there were rumors and predictions of a hurricane, but the inhabitants scoffed at the notion that they would see anything more than some water in their fields. Living on the edge of Lake Okeechobee with its 730 square miles of water, the town was accustomed to sieges of high water. They had several times been through floods, but the new levee around the lake was supposed to protect them from any recurrence.
As night drew on, a telegram of warning from the Miami weather bureau was received in Moore Haven. Several citizens read it, but most just shrugged it off. There was a "social" at the Woman's Club that night, and most of the townspeople attended.
Midnight came. The party broke up, and the people came outside to find the wind blowing harder and the clouds scudding before it. At the lake, the water was lapping dangerously near the top of the levee. Two men went up to see, and became alarmed. They managed to rig up a siren and rouse the town.
A few were roused to seek safety in flight, but most felt that they could wait out the storm in their homes. It was a fatal mistake. By morning, the worst of the storm burst upon them; the wind was blowing at full hurricane force 120 miles per hour and it was pushing that great mass of water in the lake toward the town. Up, up, the water rose, up to the top of the dyke, and then over! The surging waters burst through the soft mud wall and surged into the town.
Clinging to trees and rooftops, some people survived the flood, but more than two hundred were drowned in the rushing water. One man, who died with all his family, was found to have a telegram in his pocket warning of the hurricane and suggesting that the town should be evacuated. Storm warnings disregarded.
Not only so, but the survivors went back ("It can't happen here again! ") and rebuilt their homes around the lake. Two years later another storm came. This time more than 2,000 died in the raging waters.
Today the storm warnings are flying again. Not for a storm of wind and water this time, nor for the like of any storm man has ever seen, but a storm that will have men crying to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of His wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?" Rev. 6:16,1716And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? (Revelation 6:16‑17).
A storm of the wrath of God! No one can stand before that! If there were not a storm shelter provided, no one could be saved. But just as those who are wise flee to the hurricane shelter or to the storm cellar when storm warnings are received, so will those who are wise "flee from the wrath to come." God has provided a shelter; there is a hiding place: "A Man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest." Isa. 32:22And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. (Isaiah 32:2).
A Man? Yes, the Man, "the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all." He gave Himself; He went to the cross and bore the wrath of God against sin so that we—you and I—could be safe from the storm that is coming on the world. Have you sought that shelter yet?