There was a day when it snowed REALLY hard.

We haven't gotten a lot of snow in Chicago this winter. Really barely any. But that wasn't the case in February of 2011. Last year we had one of the worst snow storms ever. Last year was when Snowmaggedon hit!

It was a year ago February the snow storm of the century headed toward Chicago. Now in saying that, this century is only 12 years old. Regardless, the winters over the last 12 years have for the most part been pretty lame. But what we saw crawling across the weather radars toward us last year did indeed look like a huge blue monster. The way that people talked about getting extra water, extra food, fuel for generators, blankets and the such, it was like they were getting ready for Y2K all over again.

The hour came. The monster crawled across Chicago. It was indeed the storm of this young century.

Snowmageddon. 

We were living in my in-laws house at the time. These are pictures from the morning after:





 

It took me three hours to dig my car out. We couldn't walk the sidewalk to the backyard for over a week. Regardless, I can be glad I wasn't one of those stuck on Lake Shore Dr:

 

The storm was horrible. Horrible.

A few days later,  I left my house at 7:50am, which is late for me on a morning I'm teaching because I try to leave normally between 7:15-7:30a. As I was getting to my car I looked down and saw this...

 

That was pretty much all that had been left on my street of Chicago's Snowmaeddon 2011, just a few days after it happened.

 
I'm still thinking about things from yesterday, and the idea of going back into the past.

Sometimes life just sucks.

There's probably a nicer way to say it, but those four words ring pretty true for me. And I know that they do for others as well. 

We go through storms in life. 

Some are flurries, some are of snowmageddon status. 

Some we go through alone, in some we have people's arms around us. 

Some we can see through to what's ahead, some are so thick we feel blinded. 

Some just feel downright impossible to get through and too painful to bear.

If you are in one of those storms, be encouraged by five of the most important words in the Bible:

"And it came to pass..."

Which means it didn't come to stay.

The storm will end. The snow will melt.

That isn't at all to minimize anything that any of us go through. When the snow is coming down a couple inches per hour it hurts and it is freezing.

But it will one day melt, be it on this side of eternity or the other.

Be encouraged.

Your life might feel like this:



But the storm will one day look like this:

 

Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the LORD, and my right is disregarded by my God"? Have you not known? Have you not heard?The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. - Isaiah 40:27-31

This is a reworking of a post from last year, but I thought it was a good followup to yesterday