Up in Flames

Recently we purchased an investment property along with my Dad and brother. The place was a total dump and needed to be demolished. We could have done this with a bulldozer or with fire; we chose fire. The city fire dept. came to the property around 6:00 on Sat. morning and did some search and rescue practice with small fires inside the house. Then, about 8:00 they lit the whole place on fire. It was amazing to watch how it consumed the buildings. I have never seen a fire of such size. The boys and I were sitting in the fire truck to keep warm and even through the truck we could feel the heat of the fire! The sight offered opportunities to tell the Bible story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. I think it was more meaningful with a raging fire as the story "prop". Later, we headed to the station and fed the fire department lunch.

Although it was quite an amazing sight, it was a bit too much for my little Ethan. He had a very hard time wanting to go to sleep last night. He had a million and one questions about if our house could start on fire and how it could if it could and how he could get out etc. etc. He wanted me to pray that God would get him out of a fire (and wanted to know how God could ... and concluded that it was like "magic"--the understanding of a little boy. We'll clear that up in a year or so.) He also wanted me to pray that God would take any fire dreams out of his head. And, then wanted to know where God puts the fire dreams. He asked if the people all got out of the house. Oh my! I felt awful that he thought there were people in there and the fire fighters just stood by and watched it burn! He also saw a life size and lifelike dummy in the back of one of the trucks with its legs all bent weird and unclothed and asked about that guy. I told him when he saw it that it wasn't a real guy, but it must have been the image. To top it off, he has fire trucks/hats/coats painted on his walls! He couldn't escape the images last night. Thankfully he DIDN'T have any fire dreams! I was really praying that God wouldn't let those dreams come. Despite how sad it made me feel that he was feeling that way, I loved that it brought him closer to God. I also loved that it gave him a very healthy fear of fire!


Here they are in the truck: Carson (my sister's little boy), Ethan, Brodie (my cousin's little boy), and Emmett.