The Blowing of the Wind

This morning on Facebook, a friend wrote, “I’m thankful for the WIND, it reminds me that the Holy Spirit is moving among us!”

Wind. Monday evening, I struggled to open the car door against the strength of the wind. Wind is something we don’t think about until it captures our attention with its mighty strength – similar to the power of the ocean. The yesterday’s wind brought today’s torrential rain that obliterates my view of Spring. The plethora of raindrops cloud my vision of the sky and trees outside my window.

I thought about my ancestors who endured the cold wind or the hot wind in various areas of this world. How did they protect themselves from the wind’s ravages? In our sheltered lives, we hardly notice the voices of the wind or we call it a natural disaster when it intrudes into our lives. As farmers in the Ukraine and in Kansas and Oklahoma, they often prayed for good weather for their crops. They watched the seasons, plowed and planted and rejoiced when God watered the crops.

When I was small I learned that we cannot see the wind…and yet we see the effects of the wind in our world. In my almost 8 decades of life, I have seen those effects:

• The stories Mom told of the Dust Bowl Days in the Twenties, when wet blankets hung on the doorways and the windows to stop the biting dust from sneaking into the house.
• A birthday party’s homemade ice cream tasted gritty because the sand the wind blew into my dish.
• The enchanting snow tunnel (to me as a child) outside our back door that was dug to the barn after the wind created a roof high drift in Clinton, Oklahoma, in 1937. Mother’s voice grew hoarse reading The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew….chapter after chapter for the three of us.
• A newly made bed with sheets that have hung in the sunshine and a spring wind will always remind me of home.
• I remember walking home in a brisk winter wind, without buttoning my coat or wearing gloves. Oh, the pain as I let warm water run over my icy hands.
• Driving south toward Minneola, Kansas, at night from the hospital. A snow was beginning to develop. The wind brought each unique flake toward me, as I drove. I prayed that it was not a blizzard.
• Just east of Dodge City, Kansas, we often climbed the hill behind our house to watch clouds and the wind playing hide and go seek. We had a full basement, a safe haven in the event of a storm. One day the general velocity of 30 mph wind increased to 60 mph. The first day the wind came from the south. The next day, 60 mph wind came from the north – trimming all the trees.
• An Oklahoma tornado tore through Watonga bringing damage to my parents’ home – while they sat in the Siemens Cellar and later under the narrow kitchen table when the tornado made another pass – praying and singing praise songs.

Poetic descriptions of the wind have been written in verse or prose: “Poetry is the impish attempt to paint the color of the wind!”

Watching the path of the wind in the fall when leaves skitter from a tree and across a field, or flowers in the spring create a blossom-snow. A child holds a string of the kite as it dips and bows in the wind and dreams of flying to the stars. A snowfall, so gentle, can become a blizzard whiting out the landmarks around us when the velocity of the wind increases.

The words to songs containing, ‘waving wheat’ took on new meaning when I saw the wind playing hide and seek in the field of golden wheat.

Where does the wind come from and where does it go? What is the purpose for the wind?

Psalm 135:7 – He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouses.
Psalm 104:4 – He makes winds his messengers, flames of fire his servants.

John 3:8 – “The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

My friend is right. The Wind is a reminder of the Holy Spirit. It is the servant of God. We cannot see Jesus. We cannot see God. Yet, we see the effect our Lord has in our lives and in the lives of others.

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