Watching cyclone Yasi approach the already battered Queensland coast this week has been harrowing to say the least! Thousands of people were warned to evacuate which resulted in a wonderful outcome of zero casualties. All glory and praise be to God for answering our prayers! Western Australia had its own cyclone threat last weekend, I know my sister-in-law Nikki with her family, cut her holiday short in Busselton to get out of the way of the approaching storm. We are very blessed with all our modern technology to have the warnings.

I mentioned in a sermon a couple of weeks ago, there’s little chance of navigating around the storm when you are already in it! But reality is that storms can hit when you least expect them. Even in today’s world with all our technology, with all our knowledge, some things happen that totally take us by surprise. And I’m not just talking weather storms! There are financial storms, marital storms, relational storms, there are storms that come with rearing  children, there are storms that happen in our vocation, there are health storms and accident storms, etc… Just when you think life is smooth and easy, a ‘storm’ blows in and before you know it you’re managing collateral damage. That’s the nature of storms, they are unplanned and unpredictable, you don’t always see them coming, there’s not always a  warning and they can be ferocious! Well what do we do as Christians? How do we handle these storms of life? Thanks be to God, there are some very interesting reports of storms in the Bible from which we can draw on God’s wisdom…(Mark 4:35-41)

A door gives access to a space you might want to be in. The right way to get into an enclosed space is by the doorway, not by the window, mostly thieves climb through windows. The truth is you could hurt yourself climbing through a window simply because that is not how you are meant to enter an enclosed space. You are meant to go through the doorway. That’s the purpose of the door! Jesus said in John 10:7 “… that I Myself am the Door for the sheep.”  Jesus is the one and only door into heaven. Jesus is the door to all the blessings of eternal life. In John 14:6, Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” If there is no Christ, there is no way to God. If He is not the Door, there is no entrance into God’s presence. But God has made a way into His presence; Jesus is the door through which you gain access to a space you ‘might want to be in’. Trying ‘other ways of access’ will only hurt and disappoint you.