Tornadoes

 Well now that I am back home I found myself today remembering that horrible spate of severe tornadoes that hit the US just before Easter time! It seemed that while others were reading ABOUT them *I* seemed to be doomed to be *IN* them!!!!!!!!! The Picture above was sent to me by a Hollywood prodcuer friend of mine who had read me talking about the FIRST Tornado which was in the process of touching down RIGHT ON TOP of the Renaissance Hotel where we were in a conference held by the WWPF. Those of you who were in the building at the time remember the storm and then the HONNK HONNK HONNK of the Hotels alert system advising the guests to come down to the lobby and there attendants would point them to safety. WEEEEELLLLLL THIS photo shows the funnel cloud coming down RIGHT OVER THE TOP of that hotel! It was ONLY the beginning of a spell of Horrible Tornadoes I would be in over the next couple weeks! Just a few days later I was in Memphis, Tennessee eating dinner with Brother Caleb Adams and His wife when the Tornado Sirens sounded again! I was sitting there thinking "Does this mean like we should be taking shelter or WHAT????" Well didn't have to think TOO long because in minutes police men came rushing in telling everyone to go to the BATHROOMS (evidently that was the safest place in the building) BECAUSE A TORNADO WAS ON THE GROUND HEADING STRAIGHT FOR US! (Dinner was over needless to say!) Then later that same night back at my hotel the sirens sounded AGAIN and continued going off and on into the wee hours of the morning as Tornado after tornado buffeted the area!

 THEN the next day drove over to Jacks Creek, Tennessee to preach the morning service (It was Easter Sunday) for Brother Daniel, and then the evening service for Brother Huey. Nice sunny day. NO TORNADOES! Woke up Monday and drove the ninety minutes back to Memphis where I was booked at the Hyatt Place Hotel. Starting out was a nice beautiful sunny day! BUT... half way to Memphis the sky up ahead started looking dark then deep PURPLE! The rain was pelting by then and then lightning started hitting the GROUND all around the interstate I was on! Then the rain became hail! Uh Oh! I thought .... this does NOT bode well!!!! I had satellite radio in the car and CNN was saying "WE HAVE REPORTS OF A TORNADO ON THE GROUND IN MEMPHIS RIGHT NOW..... MORE ON THIS AFTER THIS MESSAGE!!!"

 Now *I* am yelling at the radio ..."NOT NOW!!!! Tell us about the tornado! TELL US ABOUT THE TORNADO!!!!!"

  Finally after a commercial about Tender Vittles Cat Food or something,  the reporter comes back on ... "There is a tornado reported on the ground at this time in Memphis, Tennessee." I imediately start wondering along the rain drenched wind driven hail battered lightning tortured interstate .... "Hmmmmmm where am *I* in relationship to Memphis?" At that very moment the Tornado sirens go off  (I didn't even know they HAD them along the Interstates!) My adrenalin is pumping, my spirit is praying "Jesus Jesus Jesus!" Lightning everywhere and the winds just unbelievable! The reporter continues...
"We have more on that Tornado on the ground in the Memphis area... It is reported to be on the ground in the Germantown area of the city. If you are in the Germantown area TAKE COVER IMMEDIATELY!!!!"

 SOOOOO I am now thinking at a zillion miles an hour... "Germantown! Germantown! Where am I in relationship to Germantown????!!!" Just then I approach one of those green Interstate Exit signs and the sign says "GERMANTOWN EXIT" just then a bolt of lightning hits the ground right in front of my car and I am thinking "Oh Lord Oh Lord Oh Lord Oh Lord!' I make the decision to get off and right there is a Super Eight Motel BRICK not stucco, so I make this dash through the hail into the little lobby only to find it PACKED with other motorists who have all had the same idea that I did. We went through about half an hour of fear and then the storm blew over and it was sunny again.

 By now I was a nervous wreck BUT THE BEST WAS YET TO COME... Or rather the WORST!!!! For the next two or three hours it was nice and sunny but the radio kept warning of major tornado possibilites for the Memphis area. I was there at the hotel in Memphis and about five o'clock you could see the storm coming right up to and then ACROSS the Mississippi River! The tornado sirens began again about five o'clock and I dont think they stopped until sometime the next morning! THAT was the night that hundreds (I think there were something like two hundred tornadoes touch down across the south!)But that was the night that the tornadoes just devastated so much of the south! Here are some pictures I took of the after math! It was so numbing to just SEE this! Absolutely NUMBING! The devastation was unbelievable! It looked like the aftermath of a World War II bombing raid! I honestly don't see how the people in the South can possibly live through this all the time! I Lived in the Middle East all through the years of the Gulf War, situated smack dab between Bagdad and Jerusalem! And yet all through that I don't think I ever experienced the high and constant level of tension and fear that I did for that period of a few weeks in TORNADO ALLEY!