THE LITTLE PORCELAIN BOXES
This is a true story, and is the reason
for the little porcelain boxes (eggs to
some) that are the images representing
my pages.
THE LITTLE PORCELAIN BOXES
I had a dream one November night in
1987, which has been the fueling fire of
my desire to serve the Lord. I was a
single mom with two kids still home and
my mother living with us.
I was running a private day care in my
home, and was very active in my church.
It had been a strange fall, even for
eastTexas. Here it was the first part
of November, and we were still having
weather in the 80's and 90's. It
seemed as if summer just didn't want to
let go.
It was a Sunday and my family and I had
gotten out of church late in the
afternoon due to an after church pot
luck dinner. The weather bureau had
been predicting rain, with possibility
of severe storms.
When we came out to the parking lot, we
noticed that the weather was looking
ominous. It was a white gray with
clouds moving across the sky at a
pace such as you will only see in the
Texas skies. I told the kids to get
into the car, and my mom was following.
A lady we had met in the church for the
first time stopped me to talk about some
of her personal needs. My mother who
was normally very quiet, kept after me
to hurry up. I was more than a little
irritated with her for the rudeness, but
finally she got my attention and I
agreed that the sky looked like a storm
was approaching.
We got home, about three miles from the
church, and my mother and my son went
into the bedroom to watch a the Cowboys
play; and my daughter and I were in the
livingroom watching something else.
I kept looking out the front window and
noticing how terribly dark it was
getting. Our living room faced the
northwest, and would usually be the
first to catch any storms coming in.
As the afternoon progressed, I kept
watching these clouds coming in, and
decided to check the windows in my
mother's room which faced the southeast.
They just had light grey clouds; nothing
to remark about. My mother and my son
laughed at me for being such a fanatic
the about weather.
Finally I noticed that the clouds in the
front of the apartment (northwest) had
turned a dark mud brown. I got up off
the sofa and went, one more time, to my
mother's room. I told them they just had
to come see the sky in the front window.
They came in and saw what I was seeing
all along, and couldn't believe what
they were saw. It was then that we
decided to put the radio on.
Just as we tuned into our local station,
the announcer came on and told us that
Palestine had just been hit by a
tornado. It had come up the western side
of Palestine. At that time they had no
idea what kind of damage had been done.
Within minutes we got a phone call from
my oldest son who lived in the Westwood
area of Palestine.
He said "mom, me and Joanne are ok; our
house is gone, but we are fine."
It took a minute for that to sink in,
and then you could have knocked me over
with a light puff of air. I realized
that my son and his wife had been in
that tornado. While we sat watching our
usual Sunday afternoon programs, their
very lives were being threatened.
The really strange thing about this is
that my family and I have always been
very active in church and all of us
claimed to be born again good faithful
christians. We had raised the kids in
active churches, christian schools, and
tried to keep the Lord first in our
lives. With this, I still have to say
that my son was trying the boundries of
God's will, and was trying to decide
which side of the fence he would sit on.
His wife didn't know Jesus yet. She was
sweet girl, but had never heard about
salvation. She was watching to see what
a christian was. When they called to
tell us they were alright, I gathered up
my mom, the two kids, and got into the
car, and went over to my daughter-in
-law's mom's to see for myself if they
really were alright.
This was my first experience of having
something threaten my family, and
I didn't like it.
As we were driving over there, we
noticed two small brown funnels to the
north of the loop where we were
crossing. It seemed too unreal to
believe that we could be seeing this.
This is something people tell you about;
it doesn't really happen to you, right?
My son told us that they had been
watching a movie on their VCR when it
suddenly got real dark. Before this,
their had been no warning. It got so
dark that they couldn't see outside.
They were about to go outside to see
what was happening, when my son said
their ears felt like they were going to
burst.
That was when they heard this horrible
sound like standing next to the train
tracks and hearing the passing of a
speeding locomotive. At that time they
realized what it was they were hearing.
They first ran to they bathroom to get
into the bathtub. That is what everyone
says to do. Then for a reason my son
wouldn't understand until later,
something told him to get up and get out
of that bathroom. They ran into the
bedroom and went under the bed and
pulled the mattress over their heads.
By this time, the funnel was directly
over them, they could see the windows
blow out and the doors blow open and
shut so fast that you couldn't count the
times. He said nothing in the house was
blowing out, but the place was rocking
in the force of this tornado.
Now, you have to know that this house
was smaller that most two-car garages.
It had cracks in the walls of the
livingroom that you could see the
outside through. There was almost no
paint on the outside siding, and it was
a mess. This was before the tornado. I
used to joke and tell them that this
house wouldn't stop a breeze. It pays to
be careful what you say.
Anyway, my son told me later, that while
he was under that bed, the Lord spoke to
him and reminded him that he had made a
committment to follow Him. Now, this
wasn't a call to preach, or anything
grand like that, but it was a commitment
to live for Jesus.
My son told the Lord that afternoon that
he would get back into church and living
for Jesus.
"Train up a child in the way he should
go: and when he is old, he will not
depart from it." Proverbs 22:6
I didn't hear about this part for about
two weeks. I did realize how lucky they
were to be alive, because within seconds
of moving under the bed, a big old oak
tree with a base trunk three people
couldn't hug, fell into that bath tub.
If they had been there they would have
been killed.
This house was shown on television for
better than a week which really forced
us to realize how blessed they were.
Now, this brings me to the beautiful
porcelain boxes.
PAGE TWO
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