{"id":2012,"date":"2010-05-17T09:58:13","date_gmt":"2010-05-17T15:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/192.185.166.32\/~davidfoster\/?p=2012"},"modified":"2010-05-17T09:58:13","modified_gmt":"2010-05-17T15:58:13","slug":"things-i%e2%80%99m-learning-from-the-flood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/things-i%e2%80%99m-learning-from-the-flood\/","title":{"rendered":"Things I\u2019m Learning From the Flood"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"As odd as it may sound, life in Nashville seems to be getting back to normal.\u00a0 But it is, most definitely a new<\/em> normal.<\/p>\n

People are still devastated, many homes have not even been touched, and people are walking away from their entire life\u2019s work in frustration and despair.<\/p>\n

But on the other hand, there are a lot of stories that we will hear, songs will be written that have been inspired by the selfless acts of good people, and I dare say we may even have a movie.<\/p>\n

So in the in between, these are the things that I am learning from the flood.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. It rains on the good and the not so good.<\/strong> There is no reasoning why it flooded in certain places.\u00a0 It just did.\u00a0 It was, you might say, a perfect storm.\u00a0 It rains.\u00a0 If it didn\u2019t rain on you, it\u2019ll be your turn next time.<\/li>\n
  2. Stuff ruins when wet.<\/strong> The economy has gone a long way toward breaking us from being total consumers.\u00a0 The flood in our city will also help.\u00a0 It will help us put our stuff in perspective.\u00a0 It\u2019s great to have stuff, nice homes, boats, cars, and motorcycles.\u00a0 But stuff ruins when wet.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t endure, it doesn\u2019t come to stay, and it can\u2019t give you ultimate satisfaction.<\/li>\n
  3. There are good people who will move into action<\/strong> without having to be asked or forced: a lot of good, generous people out there who live out their faith in loving sacrificial ways.\u00a0 I\u2019ve seen it as I walk through this city.<\/li>\n
  4. Churches are not good at helping people.<\/strong> Here\u2019s what I mean. That\u2019s certainly not true if you believe that the church is its people.\u00a0 And when they move into action based on their convictions, then churches do a lot of good.\u00a0 But as organizations, churches really suck at getting much done. I\u2019ve seen that too as I\u2019ve walked through the floods.\u00a0 I\u2019ve seen the sad thing happen again. Some people are just looking for credit, to make videos to show how good they are.<\/li>\n
  5. I\u2019ve learned that hope is the best of things.<\/strong> The hope of rebuilding, the hope of coming back when you\u2019re down is a great motivator and strengthener.<\/li>\n
  6. I\u2019ve also learned with this flood that despair is the worst thing that can take over a man or a woman.\u00a0 Not the loss of a home, not the loss of a job, or your worldly possessions, not even your memories; but when despair overwhelms you, you\u2019re done.\u00a0 You\u2019re toast.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    That\u2019s why hope is the best of things.\u00a0 And that\u2019s why I am learning to hope for better days after the flood.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    As odd as it may sound, life in Nashville seems to be getting back to normal.\u00a0 But it is, most definitely a new normal. People are still devastated, many homes have not even been touched, and people are walking away from their entire life\u2019s work in frustration and despair. But on the other hand, there … Continue reading “Things I\u2019m Learning From the Flood”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"series":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2012"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2012\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2012"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidfoster.tv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=2012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}