I woke up this morning in a different place. I didn’t move, but the air did. This isn’t the moist, cold air off the ocean; this is the hot, dry air from the desert. Sometime in the night the winds shifted. It happens frequently this time of year and it means only one thing for southern California: it means a high fire danger day. These winds come whipping through the mountain canyons like you just opened an oven, and all the vegetation is dry from the summer where they say it never rains in southern California. Well it doesn’t, from May to November, except for a rare tropical thunderstorm now and then. So the stage is set for an accident, or an arsonist, or sometimes a dry electrical storm in the mountains will do it. The sun isn’t even up and its 74 degrees. From Santa Barbara to San Diego, we are on high alert.

Does this happen where you live? I know it isn’t unique to this part of the country because it used to happen when we lived in Massachusetts. Suddenly I would wake up and be in Florida feeling and smelling the tropical breezes off the Keyes. It’s a wind shift, and it can change everything.

Winds of change. They can come without a moment’s notice. They can bring good or ill.  You folks have helped us weather some pretty nasty storms of late, and they are not over. We could use a wind shift.

Regardless, it is strengthening to know that God doesn’t change. He is always there and always available. In times like these – in the shifting winds – these words take on fresh meaning:

God is our refuge and strength,
    an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
    and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam
    and the mountains quake with their surging.
 
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
    the holy place where the Most High dwells.
God is within her, she will not fall;
    God will help her at break of day.
Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
    he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
 
The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.
 
Come and see what the Lord has done,
    the desolations he has brought on the earth.
He makes wars cease
    to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
    he burns the shields with fire.
He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
    I will be exalted among the nations,
    I will be exalted in the earth.”
 
The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.
–  Psalm 46