Hurricane Supplication Day is June the 1st.  I have been keeping this day and the first week of June close to my heart since 2017.  It was on September 20 when we started living through Hurricane Maria. I am still mystified how a landlocked Kentucky Rain Crow like me lived through Hurricane Maria.  This was not like any other Army mission because my wife and three children came along for the ride. 

I will share some of my personal experiences in a moment.  Right now I need your help.  Will you help me keep Hurricane Supplication Week from June 1st to June 7th? Here are the three very simple things I am requesting

1. Pray daily June 1-7. Ask God to protect Puerto Rico and the Caribbean from Hurricanes and Tropical Storms. (Hurricane Season is June 1 through November 30).

2. Tell someone what you are doing and ask them to join you.

3. Ask your church to pray for protection on Sunday June 4th.

I know in today’s world some will think it is superstitious to pray for weather. I have two examples that trump those opinions in my mind.

1. Jesus spoke to storms and he said, “Peace! Be Still.”  I will follow Jesus at this point.

2. I am an Army Chaplain.  Our Corp has in our wheelhouse what we call, “The weather prayer.”  It was December 1944 and the weather in Europe was our third enemy.  It was hampering efforts to liberate the continent from Fascism. General Patton asked Chaplain O’Neill to pray.  He did!  He wrote out the prayer.  The Third Army printed the prayer, signed by Patton and distributed it to Allied troops.  I can almost see Soldiers opening the prayer as they fought in the snow, rain, and mud. As many know the weather cleared and Allied troops advanced for six days.

I learned something about storms in 2017.  You always resist storms.  I stood against Hurricane Irma.  Irma was a direct hit on the Virgin Islands.  It was on track for a direct hit on Puerto Rico.  In my spirit I saw the storm moving North.  Hours before making landfall the storm tracked North. Puerto Rico only experienced tropical storm force winds.  It was still enough to knock down trees and take out the power and water for a week.

Two weeks later, Hurricane Maria began tracking toward Puerto Rico.  I was standing on my patio moving the outside furniture inside again.  It struck me, “What are the chances of being in two category five storms in two weeks?”  It seemed to me to be sinister and evil.

I stood against Hurricane Maria as  I stood against Irma.  Maria cut a diagonal path across Puerto Rico from the Southeast to the Northwest.  We were a few days into the relief operations for the Army when I realized storms are from hell.  They are sinister and evil. This storm had taken property and life and now it wanted to take even more.  This storm was after our soul. 

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It was 1999 and my church was really afraid.  I was shocked.  I thought it was a joke.  But, one night I finally saw the fear in their faces.  We were at a fellowship supper in some one's home.  We were laughing and having a good time until someone said Y2K.  

I know some do not remember Y2K.  In short, when the year 2,000 rolled around there was going to be a global economic shut down.  Computers were going to crash because they were not programmed to roll over to the new century.

The crash would result in clashes and wars.  There would be food and fuel shortages.  It would be a dog-eat-dog and root-hog-or-die world.  People were storing food by the barrels, literally.  Some people made a good living on selling large plastic blue barrels.  They were available in every flea market.  They were also putting up fences and stock piling money and arms - no joke. 

I saw their faces that night, And, I felt a tangible presence of fear in the room.  It was evil.  I left that night talking to Angela, "Did you feel that?"  She confirmed what we had discerned.  Our people were afraid and it had a horrific grip on their life.  It was controlling how they felt and how they acted.

I prayed for several days and launched into a sermon series on "The Book of Revelation."  I know that sounds ridiculous.  It seems like that would have added fuel to the fire.  Some will remember that the "Left Behind Series" was also very popular in those years. 

"Jesus is the Now King" contains some of what I preached in 1999 to a small very afraid church.  I preached some of those messages when I was deployed to the Horn of Africa in 2013.  I preached them again in 2020 when we came face-to-face with covid 19 ( I never capitalize covid, that is just too much credit.)  In the epilogue of this book there is a powerful testimony given by Angela where she describes how she fought back when she had covid 19. She was in ICU at Walter Reed Army Hospital for two weeks.  I included her testimony because it is a living example of the combat principles taught in "Jesus is the Now King."  Make now mistake about it we are at war - daily combat!  The enemy is trying to steal our righteousness, peace, and joy everyday.  It is time to fight back.