Washed Away

My grandmother led us stalwartly up the mountain road.

She had on her walking hat and made sure that we each had our walking sticks, either intricately carved or lobbed off a nearby tree.

Each walk had a different story: 

There’s a secret message tree just ahead with a knothole where explorers put secret messages.

The bear came just this way to his cave last week after raiding the garbage cans.

Indians walk without leaving footprints. Can you walk lightly so you don’t leave footprints?

Every walk was an adventure with Nan.

It was difficult this week to see photographs of the destruction of those roads and mountainsides in Western North Carolina. I remembered what I recently taught in journalism class: Often, news stories evoke compassion.

The loss is still being calculated. The floods begin to recede. Stories are just being shared of the mudslides, the wind, the rain.

Everything has been so unexpectedly washed away.

The very road that had once been an idyllic adventure of a Grandmother with her grandchildren now looks like a rushing river. No pavement, no houses, and no power poles are left, and the people of the Mountain are sheltering in place, receiving food and water supplies via helicopter air drops. 

I would sleep with my Grandmother in the tippy-top of the loft of her mountain house while wild winds raged at the tippy top of that mountain. Through the creaking of the roof and walls, she would say, “Don’t be afraid. Jesus is here.”

Looking at the photos of the swathes of mud left by mudslides, I wondered at the description of sin being washed away in hymns sung by many in those mountains.

Are you washed in the blood, in the soul cleansing blood of the Lamb?

Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.

What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus!

The lives, homes, and infrastructure lost in the mountains this week were not sinful, but seeing them be washed away reminded me of the temporariness of life, the momentariness of the golden moments, and the complete necessity we all have for Jesus to wash away our sins.

Washing away my sin took a devastating flood. It required that the pleasant idols I had built for myself be destroyed. It would leave a muddy mess that would require months (years?) of clean up.

The casualty was Christ. He lost His life in that flood of God’s love that made a wreck out of all my sinful desires. However, He rose again to reclaim, rebuild, and redeem me so that I could walk beside Him through every adventure He sends.

“You are… a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light.”

If you’ve been forgiven by Jesus, join with the believers in Western North Carolina by praying for their area and communities to be restored and praise Jesus that He washes away our sins while also being the firm foundation we need to stand on in troubled times. Don’t be afraid. Jesus is here. 

Here is one way to give to help family friends who lost their home in a mudslide in Boone, NC:

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